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To THE Editor: 

Should you deem the subject of this pamphlet 
worthy of your consideration, as a special favor would 
you kindly have mailed to us a copy of the paper 
containing notice, as we are anxious to have at hand 
the opinions of leading journalists. 

Very respectfully, 

A. L. BANCROFT & CO., 

721 Market St., San Francusc^o, Cal. 



THE 



EARLY AMERICAN 



CHKONICLEES 



HUBERT HOWE BANCROFT. 

API? 6 1883; 



SAN FRANCISCO : 
A. L. BANCROFT & COMPAJSTS', PUBLISHERS. 

1883. 






t 



if 



k 



THE EARLY AMERICAN 



OHROlSriOLERS. 



Facts can be accurately known to us only by the most rigid observation 
and sustained and scrutinizing scepticism. rr, .q„,j^ 



In the North American Review for April 1876 
appeared an article bj Lewis H. Morgan entitled 
''Montezuma's Dinner," to which some prominence 
has been given, notably and of late by Thomas Went- 
worth Higginson in Har])ers Magazine for August 
1882, in an article entitled "The First Americans." 
As Mr Morgan takes for his text the second vol- 
ume of my Native Races of the Pacific States, which 
treats of the aboriginal civilization of the Mexican and 
Central American table-lands, and as his remarkable 
hypotheses, which seem to find intelligent support, 
affect not alone the quality of American aboriginal 
culture, but the foundations of early American his- 
tory, and indeed of all historic evidence, I deem it 
my duty to state briefly and plainly my views upon 
the subject. 

I confess to have been a little startled by the state- 
ment of Colonel Higginson, that the speculations of 
Mr Morgan were so generally accepted by scholars. 



2 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

Nevertheless I was pleased to learn that within a few 
years there seemed to have come an answer to the 
question, who and whence were the aboriginal Amer- 
icans; that the literary and monumental remains of 
the Aztecs, Mayas, and Mound-builders might now 
be translated by skilful students; that a clew to the 
labyrinths of race and origin had been found — found 
thirty years ago, though successfully applied for only 
eight or ten years; and when further assured that 
conjecture in this direction has begun for science 
a new era, and that although there may be some 
mysteries relating to humanity not yet solved, there 
remains little affecting American archseology which 
the new theory will not make plain — I was pleased, 
because these are things I have long wished to know. 
But when informed that early American annals are 
by the light of this new theory transformed, and to a 
great extent annulled, the eyes of the first comers 
having deceived them ; that the aboriginal culture, its 
arts, literature, sciences, polities, and religions being 
not these but other things, as is clearly shown by 
the ' new interpretation,' and that the tales of the 
conquerors must accordingly be written anew, written 
and read by this new transforming light; that there 
never was an Aztec or a Maya empire, but only wild 
tribes leagued like the northern savages ; that Yucatan 
never had great cities, nor Montezuma a palace, but 
that as an ordinary Indian chief this personage had 
lived in the communal dwelling of his tribe; that we 
can see America as Cortes saw it, not in the words of 
Cortes and his companions, or in the monumental 
remains of the south, but in the reflection of New 
Mexican villages, and through the mental vagaries 
of one man after the annihilation of facts presented 
by a hundred men, I was surprised that such conceits 
should ever assume tangible form and be received as 
truth by any considerable number of scholars. I was 
not surprised, however, to see my much admired friend 
frankly admit, before concluding his essay, that there 



THE MORGAN THEORY. 3 

were lions in the path in the form of facts, that it was 
easier to beHeve the Spanish conquerors than to accept 
some of Mr Morgan's positions, and that, after all, 
the matter of origin must still end in an interrogation 
mark; 

If I rightly comprehend the Morgan hypothesis, it 
is that, by systems of kinship conspicuous in partic- 
ular among the Iroquois and Ojibways, and present in 
fainter proportions everywhere, the races of the earth 
may be divided into savage and civilized, in some such 
way as hitherto they have been classified by physical, 
linguistic, and social characteristics. In one category 
would thus be placed the Aryan and Semitic races; 
in the other the Turanian, Malayan, and American. 
Convinced that the American nations all belong to 
one family, Mr Morgan assumes that their various 
institutions must be practically identical, and that the 
social customs of extinct tribes may best be learned, 
not from the statements of men who wrote from 
actual observation, but from the study of existing 
tribes. Himself familiar with the Iroquois, and to 
some extent with other northern tribes, he applies 
the Iroquois tribal organization of gentes, phratries, 
tribes, and confederations to the nations of Mexico and 
Central and South America, thus making all savages, 
and all statements to the contrary falsehoods. Among 
other tests of civilization are those of the marriao^e 
of single pairs and inheritance, a plurality of wives or 
husbands, and community of property belonging of 
course to savagism. By this system unity of race is 
established, and the Americans are referred for their 
origin to Asia. 

With Mr Morgan's theory, as such, I have nothing 
to do. Not dealing in theories of race and origin 
myself, further than sometimes to catalogue them and 
wonder which of them all is most absurd; not being 
specially concerned whether the inhabitants of the 
Mexican and Central American table-lands are called 
savage or civilized, especially by those whose concep- 



4 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

tion of the meaning of these words is quite different 
from my own, I paid httle attention to Mr Morgan's 
article, not even once carefully reading it until my 
attention was called to it by Colonel Higginson. But 
concerning the effect of such teachings on popular 
estimates of historical evidence, particularly as touch- 
ing the early American chroniclers, I am deeply inter- 
ested. • 

If I am correctly informed, Mr Morgan obtained 
but little information from Mexico and Central Amer- 
ica supporting his theory; but as it must be common* 
and universal in order to stand at all, it was necessary 
his ipse dixit should be employed to extend his doc- 
trines over the southern plateaux; so with all his 
strength he said it must be so, and was so, all eyes 
and brains to the contrary notwithstanding. All that 
was seen and said at the time of the conquest, and 
all that has since been seen or said conflicting with 
this fancy, is illusion. Now I venture to affirm, with 
all respect, that no adequate proof exists in support of 
his suppositions concerning Mexico; that is, no rea- 
sonable, tangible evidence, such as would be accepted 
by unbiassed common-sense. There are analogies, 
some of them remarkable. Nature is everywhere 
one; the nations of the earth, of whatever origin, are 
formed on one model. But for every analogy these 
theorists have found, their predecessors have found a 
score of analogies in support of some other theory. 
Arguing from analogy to prove origin or race is* not 
sound reasoning. 

In looking over Mr Morgan's writings, it is to be 
noticed that traces of his tests become more and more 
vague as the southern and more advanced nations 
are approached. His attempt to locate the ancient 
Cibola shows no small lack of skill in the use of evi- 
dence. Likewise, though more dogmatical in some 
respects, in his later works he apparently relinquishes 
in some degree the positions which at first were main- 
tained with such arbitrary obstinacy, and spends some 



EADICAL DIFFERENCES. 5 

time in qualifying former errors; but it seems that 
disciples, more wild than their master, have arisen, 
who by the blind pursuit of their ignis fatuus are 
rushing headlong into a gulf of absurdity. It seems 
a long leap indeed, but one made by them with ap- 
parent ease, from a theory resting on a trace of cer- 
tain organizations in the north, and which may by 
much research be made to assume some weight, to an 
arbitrary conclusion that the Mayas were identical in 
their institutions with the Pueblo Indians. Grant the 
fundamental doctrine, and there is yet a wide distance 
between Zuni and Uxmal. It requires a vivid im- 
agination to see only joint-tenement structures in the 
remains at Palenque. But admitting it, the radical 
difference in plan, architecture, and sculptured and 
stucco decorations, to employ his own line of argument, 
suggests a corresponding development and improve- 
ment in other institutions and arts which would in- 
troduce some troublesome variations in the assumed 
identity with the Pueblos and Iroquois, even if all 
started together. The Maya hieroglyphs, and even 
certain of the Aztec, form also an obstacle by no means 
so easily removed. True, not being deciphered, their 
actual grade cannot be positively proved ; yet the com- 
mon picture-writing contains enough of the phonetic 
element to place the better class high above the line 
fixed by the new transforming light as the mark of 
civilization. Even by this bright illumination it seems 
scarcely possible to reconcile the testimony of exist- 
ing relics, and of Spanish witnesses who came into 
contact with the Maya and Nahua nations, with the 
narrow conclusions of supporters of the all -directing 
consanguinity. In the earlier life of the hypothesis 
the change to what is called descriptive consanguinity 
and the inheritance of property were made tests of 
civilization; but these tests were abandoned when it 
was ascertained, among other things, that the Aztecs 
did inherit personal property, and to. a certain extent 
landed estate. 



6 THE EARLY AMERICAN" CHRONICLERS. 

If this were the only theory ever advanced to prove 
unprovable propositions regarding the Americans, it 
might be more imposing; but as it is only one of fifty, 
each of which has had its day and its supporters, 
much as we would like to know what it professes 
to be able to tell, we cannot look forward with any 
degree of confidence to seeing its mighty promises ful- 
filled. Nor do I regard such investigation as in every 
respect beneficial: on the contrary, it appears to me 
detrimental where facts are warped to fit theories, the 
theory being of less importance to mankind than the 
fact. Unless care is taken, the investigations now 
going on may be absolutely damaging to science and 
truth by the evident bias of some of the investigators. 
On the other hand it is true that great discoveries 
have sprung from apparently puerile conceits; and 
facts are sure to live, however sometimes distorted, 
while false doctrines are sure to die, however ably 
presented. 

In common with all such suppositions, the paths by 
which the advocate reaches his conclusions are fuller 
of instruction than the conclusions themselves. There 
is something of instruction in the nine massive folios 
left by the poor demented Lord Kingsborough, who 
greatly desired to prove the American Indians Jews, 
though he was not one whit nearer such proof at the 
end than at the beginning. The more knowledge the 
learned Abbe Brasseur de Bourbourg brought to the 
subject the more confused he became, until the latter 
parts of his labors were directed toward revising his 
earlier conjectures. Such a course appears not unusual 
with theorists — from the dogmatic to the argumenta- 
tive, then back to the dogmatic again, forever explain- 
ing away mistakes and falling into new ones. The 
eloquent Robert Mackenzie is still in the first stage 
of dogmatism when with a glance at the map showing 
the proximity of Asia and America he would forever 
settle the question of origin. Nor is the straining of 
■modern scientists to prove Asiatic intercourse by 



ABSURDITY OF THE POSITION. 7 

shipwrecked Japanese junks at all necessary. It is a 
well established fact that for many centuries there has 
been free intercourse between the peoples on either 
side of Bering Strait, both by means of boats and by 
crossing on the ice. It may be as Mr Morgan says, 
though his arguments appear scarcely more convincing 
than the arguments of those who preceded him, or of 
those who came after him. Some of these other 
theories are held to-day; grant them all — what then? 
Grant that the Americans are one stock with the 
people of Asia, or Scandinavia, or Africa, or Armenia, 
there still remains to be proven whether the Old 
World peopled the New, or the New the Old ; where 
stood the primordial cradle or cradles of the race; 
where man was first made, and how. This involves 
a knowledge of all things tangible, to know which 
involves a knowledge of things intangible. 

It seemed easy for Mr Morgan, from his famil- 
iarity with certain of the northern tribes of America, 
to express the opinion, and bolster it by plausible 
arguments and analogies, that the various aboriginal 
nations of America were one people and their insti- 
tutions practically identical; but his whole line of 
argument in the North American Review, so far as 
relates to the extension of his system over Mexico 
and Central America — and with that alone am I 
concerned — is exceedingly weak, so much so that, as 
before stated, when the article was first published I 
deemed it not worth serious consideration; so do 
I now, except that it appears to be misleading certain 
honest minds. 

He begins by telling what the Spanish conquerors 
found in Mexico ; not what they reported themselves 
to have seen, but what they should have seen to 
establish the new interpretation, which being infal- 
lible, the Spanish conquerors did not see what they 
saw, but something else. Nor does it affect the facts 
to call the Nahua culture savagism or civilization, 
Montezuma's dwelling a palace or a tenement-house. 



8 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLEilS. 

himself emperor or cacique, and his subordinate rulers 
lords or chiefs. It is certainly cool for Mr Morgan, 
who never examined the monumental remains of the 
Aztecs, who had no greater opportunity than others 
of studying their social system, and who in fact never 
knew anything about it except upon the evidence of 
the very witnesses he denounces as blind and false, 
sweepingly to assert, in order to extend a preconceived 
theory over all the nations of America, that the con- 
querors were mistaken, that they could not have 
seen what they thought they saw. It is the old line 
of reasoning employed by learned superstition these 
many centuries; if the universe, or any part of it, 
does not accord with the doctrine, so, much the worse 
for the universe, which must thereupon be recon- 
structed. As the good elder of one of our fashionable 
churches lately remarked, " If the bible affirmed that 
Jonah swallowed the whale, I should believe it." 

Without advancing adequate evidence to show the 
existence of his system among the Nahuas, Mr Morgan 
engages in sage discussions concerning it, transform- 
ing by the light of the new interpretation as many 
of the new facts into his fancies as suits his purpose. 
In doing this, he allows the chroniclers to be right in 
whatever they say supporting his views; in all such 
statements as oppose his system they were in error. 
It was indeed a transforming light that enabled this 
man to see, not being present, what others could by 
no means perceive though they were on the ground; 
and he kindly admits that the early histories of 
Spanish America may for the most part be trusted, 
except where his pet project is touched. 

This, then, is my opinion of the Morgan theory: 
There may be grounds for certain of its suppositions in 
certain directions, but there are not sufficient grounds 
for its acceptance in regard to the nations of the Mexi- 
can and Central American table-lands, and not the 
slightest excuse for its authors in attempting to sweep 
from the face of the earth, by mere negation, all 



WHAT IS CIVILIZATION? 9 

persons and facts opposing their theory. It is not 
by such" means that reasonable hypotheses are estab- 
hshed; blank negation never yet overturned sub- 
stantial truth. Further than this, were Mr Morgan's 
system all that he claims for it, and did it in reality 
pervade alt the nations of America, including the 
Aztecs and the Mayas, it still proves nothing against 
aboriginal civilization, or against the veracity of the 
Spanish chroniclers. 

Colonel Higginson says truly that whether a people 
may properly be called civilized is a matter of defini- 
tions, though I must confess^my inability to follow 
him when he makes a radical difference of meaning 
in the terms prehistoric civilization and a very skilful 
barbarism. I may be altogether at fault in my con- 
ception of progressional phenomena and the meaning 
of the terms savage and civilized. I am so, or else 
their popular signification and use are incorrect and 
absurd. Probably no words so freely used are so 
little understood. The terms are almost universally 
employed to designate fixed conditions, when by the 
very nature of things such conditions as applied to 
man are impossible. 

Mr Morgan classified culture periods under the 
categories of savagism, barbarism, and civilization: 
to emerge from the first of which there should be 
knowledge of fire, fish subsistence^, and the bow and 
arrow; from the second, pottery, domestication of ani- 
mals, agriculture, and smelting of iron; and to attain 
full civilization a phonetic alphabet was necessary, or 
use of hieroglyphs upon stone as an equivalent. 

This may have been a convenient arrangement for 
his purpose, and I see no reason why he, and all who 
choose, should not employ it. But surely the same 
right should be accorded others, who perchance may 
find another classification convenient. For instance, 
one might wish to throw Mr Morgan's three divisions 
into the one category of savagism, and spread his idea 



10 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS, 

of civilization upon a higher plane; for surely our 
present highest civilization is as much superior to the 
condition essential to admission into his highest class 
as his highest class is superior to his lowest. Italian 
song, French art, German letters, English poetry, 
and American invention are certainly far enough in 
advance of the first use of the phonetic alphabet to 
entitle such accomplishments. to a new category. 

One estimates a nation's civilization by its agri- 
culture; another by its industrial arts; others by the 
qualit}^ of its religion, morality, literature, or politi- 
cal and social institutions. Some say that tillers of 
the soil should be preferred before herders of cattle; 
some hold workers in iron and coal above workers 
in gold and feathers; some place pottery in advance 
of sculpture, the fine arts before the industrial; some 
compare implements of war, others phonetic characters, 
others knowledge of the movements of the heavenly 
bodies; some would take a general average. 

But weighing a people's civilization, or lack of it, 
by any of these standards, yet other standards are 
necessary by which to measure progress. What is 
meant by half civilized, or quarter civilized, or wholly 
civilized? A half civilized nation is a nation half as 
civilized as ours. But is ours civilized, fully civilized ? 
Is there no higher culture, or refinement, or justice, 
or humanity in store for man than those formed on 
present European models, which sanction coercion, 
bloody arbitrament, international robbery, the exter- 
mination of primitive peoples, and hide in society 
under more comely coverings all the iniquities of sav- 
agism? Judging from the past and the present there 
is yet another six thousand, or sixty thousand years 
of progress for man, and then he may be as much a 
savage, comjDared with his condition at the end of the 
next twelve thousand or one hundred and twenty 
thousand years' term, as he was at the beginning 
compared with the present. Is there then no such 
thing as civilization 1 Assuredly not, in the signifi- 



THE UPWAED LEADING LINE. 11 

cance of a fixed condition, a goal attained, a complete 
and perfected idea or state. Civilization and savagism 
are relative and not absolute terms. To attempt to 
make them absolute and apply them to fixed con- 
ditions is to render them meaningless, and make 
null the conditions indicated. For if civilization is 
a fixed state, and not a moving forward, then the 
nation which ten thousand years ago was civilized, 
having made some progress from primeval savagism, 
may be to-day savage, having yet as much progress, 
to make during the next hundred centuries; that is 
to say, the present people of London and Paris may 
perhaps not improperly be called savages by the 
wonderfully advanced citizens of Wrangel Island ten 
thousand years hence. The moment the man primeval 
kindles a fire, or employs a crooked stick in catching 
food, he has entered upon his never ending progres- 
sional journey ; he is no longer wholly and primordially 
savage. The terms being rightly employed, there are 
no absolute savages or civilized peoples on the earth 
to-day; and when there are so many standards by 
which progress may properly be measured, is it wise 
to warp fundamental facts in dogmatically thrust- 
ing one people into the category of half civilized, and 
another but slightly difierent into that of one quarter 
savage? Perhaps it would do to designate the ever 
constant advance by prefixes, first a super-civilization, 
then a super-super-civilization, and so on until, between 
the beginning and end, instead of a poor single semi, we 
might have a hundred fixed stages, not one of which 
by any possibility could be so defined in words as com- 
pletely to fit any one of the millions of human con- 
ditions. At intervals along the early part of the 
upward leading line are arbitrarily placed marks, and 
those who for the moment happen to occupy the spaces 
are given designations which are supposed to adhere to 
them and all who come after them throughout all time, 
wdien howsoever definite an idea we may have of that 
end of the line which began with man, of the other, 



12 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

which will never cease spinning until the last human 
being has left the planet, we can have no conception. 
For aught we know it may not stop short of omnis- 
cience. 

Take any one of Mr Morgan's tests of civilization 
and see how absurd it is. Who gave this man the 
right to say that w^orkers in iron should be preferred 
before workers in wool, or that he who trained 
animals was greater than he who trained the light- 
ning; or that were Utah to attain to the culture of 
ancient Greece, so long as polygamy was practised 
they could not be called civilized — nay, if John Stuart 
Mill were to marry George Eliot and Mrs Browning, 
the prattle of the preacher that bound them would 
transform them into savages ! 

There are as many varieties of civilization as there 
are civilized peojDles. Civilization is an unfolding, and 
civilization develops mainly from its own germ; it is 
not a suj)erficial acquisition, but an inward growth, 
even if nourished by extraneous food. You may 
whitewash a savage with your superiority, but you 
cannot civilize him at once. 

Whether we turn to the extreme eastern kingdoms 
of Asia, or to the region watered by the Euphrates 
and the Nile, all inhabited since the remotest historic 
past by races of acknowledged culture, everywhere we 
find vast differences and strong peculiarities in the 
respective cultures, developed by environment. Some 
of the characteristics are of a high order, others de- 
scend to a grade of actual barbarism; some are in 
course of development, others stationary, or even 
retrograding. The Nahua culture partakes of the 
same traits, fashioned by its peculiar environment. 
For purposes of his own, Mr Morgan arbitrarily pre- 
scribes limits to what is called civilization in order if 
possible to prevent the Nahuas from entering its ^pre- 
cincts. In this effort he ignores many distinctively 
higher traits which the most superficial observer must 
discover among the southern races; he chooses to dis-^ 



SOMETHING OF THEIR CHARACTER. 13 

regard or slight the very distinct evidences of not 
merely settled life, but of settled communities under 
a high form of government, with advanced institu- 
tions and arts. 

I will now introduce some of the principal chroni- 
clers in person, making as close and critical an analysis 
of their characters and writings as the most sceptical 
could desire, weighing the quality of their evidence 
with evenly balanced judicial scales; after which I 
will present briefly some facts and characteristics on 
which, according to my conception of the term, the 
Nahuas and Mayas may justly lay claim to be called 
civilized. I will give beforehand the proof that 
these traits did actually exist among the peoples of 
the Mexican and Central American table-lands at the 
time of their conquest by the Spaniards, laying before 
the reader the principal authorities in their true 
character as fully as I am able to discover it, with all 
their merits and demerits, their veracity and men- 
dacity. I am not aware of any special desire to prove 
the presence or absence of a civilization in this in- 
stance. If my historical writings display any one 
marked peculiarity, it is that of a critical incredulity 
in respect of both Indian and Spanish tales. I have 
never placed myself in a position where I was tempted 
to create or exaggerate. I have no theory to advo- 
cate. My narrations are based on the reports of eye- 
witnesses whose characters have been studied, whose 
education, idiosyncrasies, positions, conditions, temper, 
and temptations have all been carefully considered in 
weighing their evidence, and the results are so given 
that the reader can easily form conclusions of his own 
if mine do not satisfy him. 

Imagine the history of the conquest written from the 
Morgan standpoint. The story might be told based on 
the authority of the chroniclers — it can never other- 
wise be written; but all that they report in any way 
conflicting with the preconceived idea must be thrown 



14 THE EAELY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

out or explained away. Imagine my account of the 
aborigines announced as A Descri^otion of the Native 
Races of North America, founded on such parts of 
existing Spanish Testimony, and on such Material 
Relics as seem to agree with the researches of Lewis 
H. Morgan among the Iroquois of New Yorh! If, 
after the evidence in the present instance is fully 
given, the reader prefers denominating the. peoples 
referred to as savages or satyrs, I have not the 
slightest objection. 

With the first expedition to Mexico went two men 
by the name of Diaz, one a priest and the other a 
soldier. Both wrote accounts of what they saw, thus 
giving us at the outset narratives from ecclesiastical 
and secular standpoints. It was a voyage along the 
coast; they did not penetrate the interior. Observa- 
tion being general, the descriptions are general. There 
was nothing remarkable about the priest; he was not 
particularly intelligent or honest. I see no reason to 
doubt the commonplace incidents of the voyage as 
given in the Itinerario cle Grijalva. The towns, with 
their white stone buildings and temple-towers glisten- 
ing in the foliage, remind him of Seville; when he 
mentions a miracle which happens at one of them, 
we know he is not telling the truth. Indeed, an 
experienced judge can almost always arrive at the 
truth even if the evidence comes only from the 
mouths of lying witnesses, provided he can examine 
them apart. Where the evidence is abundant_, the 
judge soon knows more of the facts of the case than 
any one witness, and can easily discern the true state- 
ments from the false. But on the whole, the priest 
Juan Diaz was quite moderate in his descriptions of 
what we know from other sources to have been there. 

The same evidence is offered, in the Historia Ver- 
dadera of Bernal Diaz, who attended not only on this 
vojiye, but on the first and succeeding expeditions; 
all k plain, unvarnished, and devoid of coloring. If 
hyperbole was ever to be employed it should be in 



DIAZ, TERRAZAS. 15 

connection with the revelation of these first starthnsr 
evidences of a new art and a strano^e race. But the 
enthusiasm of the author becomes marked only as he 
ascends later with Cortes to the table-land and there 
beholds the varied extent of the new culture. What 
stronger proof can there be of its superior grade when 
he passes by with comparative indifference the Yucatec 
specimen, known to us to be of rare beauty, and ex- 
presses marked wonder only on reaching Mexico? 

Bernal Diaz wrote rather late in life, after many 
accounts had already been given. He prided himself 
on giving a true history, was quite as ready to fight 
with his pen as with his sword, and having had many 
quarrels, and still harboring many jealousies, was 
very apt to criticise what others said ; and he did so 
criticise and refute. The truth is, there were here 
many and opposing elements in the evidence to win- 
now it of falsehood, far more than are usually found 
in early materials for history. 

The memorials of the relatives of Velazquez to the 
king are not worth considering, being little more than 
masses of misstatements and exaofo-erations. 

The personage known as the Anonymous Con- 
queror, probably Francisco de Terrazas, mayordomo 
of Cortes, gave a clear description of Mexico, the 
country, people, towns, and institutions, and particu- 
larly the capital city, arranged in paragraphs with 
proper headings, with drawings of the great temple 
and of the city. His method and language denote in- 
telligence and inspire confidence. No reason is known 
why he should exaggerate, many being apparent 
why he should render a true account. If his testi- 
mony can be ruled out on the ground that it does not 
fit a theory, then can that of any man who furnishes 
material for history, and our histories may as well be 
written with the theories as authorities, and have done 
with it. Dealing wholly with native institution^?, the 
writer seems to have no desire, as is the caso^'with 
some, to magnify native strength and resources for the 



10 THE EARLY AMEHICAN CHROOTCLERS. 

sake of raising the estimate of the deeds of himself 
and comrades; on the contrary, in speaking of native 
troops and arms, where a soldier would be most in- 
clined to boast, the description rather moderates the 
idea of their prowess. The population of Mexico he 
gives lower than most writers, and yet, when describing 
the city and its arts, he grows quite eloquent on the 
size, the beauty, the advanced features. The whole 
narrative bears the stamp of reliability, and the stu- 
dent may easily from internal evidence and com- 
parison deduct approximate truth. 

There are documents, such as Carta del Ejercito and 
Prohanza de Lejalde, attested under oath by hundreds, 
and therefore apparently worthy of credit above others ; 
but when we examine the motives for their production, 
and find that they were intended to palliate the con- 
duct of the conquerors, our confidence is shaken. 

Hernan Cortes was ever ready with a lie when it 
suited his purpose, but he was far too wise a man need- 
lessly to waste so useful an agent. He would not, and 
did not, acquire a name for untruthfulness. He knew 
that others were writing as well as himself, and it 
could by no possibility bring him permanent benefit 
to indulge in much deception. His misstatements 
chiefly afiiect himself and his enemies and opponents 
among his own countrymen; in giving detailed infor- 
mation concerning the natives there was little temp- 
tation to deceive. His Cartas might naturally be 
expected to aim at extolling his achievements and the 
value of his discovery. Expecting some coloring, the 
student is forewarned. We find at times what v^e feel 
inclined to stamp as exaggeration, but here also the 
enthusiasm of the narrator rises only as he approaches 
Mexico, the fame of which is dinned into his ears all 
along his march, and that by the natives nearer the 
coast, whose high advancement is attested by ruins 
and relics. Internal and collateral evidence shows his 
first descriptions of sights to be far from overrated, 
and his later discoveries to be in the main quite trust- 



HERNAN CORTfiS. 17 

•worthy. Indeed, aware that some of his statements 
may be doubted, he urges his sovereign more than 
once to send out a commission to verify them. 

Such verification was exacted. Officials did come 
out to report on the conquest and its value, only to 
join, in the main, in confirmation of what had been 
said. A series of questions was also sent to public 
men in Mexico not long after the conquest, bearing to 
a great extent on the native culture, and the answers 
all tend to confirm the high estimate already formed 
from the specimens and reports forwarded to Spain. 
One of the most exhaustive answers was sent by the 
eminent jurist Alonso cle Zurita, connected for nearly 
twenty years with Spanish audiencias in New Spain. 
He reviews the native institutions with calm and clear 
judgment, and it is only in rejecting the epithet of 
barbarians as bestowed by unthinking persons — a term 
applied also to Europeans by Chinese — that he grows 
indignant, declaring that none who had any knowledge 
of Mexican institutions and capacity could use such 
a term. He spoke while evidences were quite fresh, 
and well knew what he affirmed. Similar confirm- 
atory evidence may be found massed in the various 
collections of letters and narratives about the Indies 
brought to light from the archives of Spain and 
America, and published by the editors of the extensive 
Coleccion de Documentos Ineditos; Coleccion de Docu- 
mentos para la Historia de Mexico, etc. ; by the learned 
Navarrete, Hamirez, Icazbalceta, Ternaux-Compans, 
and others. 

Still stronger evidence of the reliability of the 
early authorities comes from the consideration that 
the rumors of Mexico's grandeur and wealth attracted 
vast hordes of hungry seekers for gold, grants of land, 
and office. Of course, most of them were disap- 
pointed, and Cortes, from his inability to please and 
gratify all, raised a host of enemies, who joined the 
large number already arraigned against him by reason 
of his successes. Their aim was naturally to vilify 

Essays akd Miscellahtt. 2 



18 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

him, to lower the achievements of the conquest, and 
to detract from the land which had failed to satisfy 
them. If ever a subject was assailed, it was this of 
Mexico, her resources and people; assailed, too, during 
the very opening years of the occupation, when the 
testimony of eye-witnesses was abundant, and particu- 
larly of the clisapiDointed, whose voice was loudest. 
Notwithstanding all this the glories of Mexico stand 
unshaken, and greater grow the confirmed ideas of 
the superior condition of her race in number, culture, 
and resources; and this, too, when the Spanish gov- 
ernment began to discountenance, the glowing reports 
of native superiority, and to lower the estimates of 
aboriginal wealth and condition, with a view to keep 
foreign attention from the country, and to hide the 
facts which would tell against it for crushing a high 
culture and enslaving a noble race. 

Thus it was that the writings of Sahagun, Las 
Casas, and others, were suppressed or neglected. But 
if many such were lost, others came finally to light 
to receive additional confirmation from the native 
records. It is to these records that we must look 
not only for confirmation of what the chroniclers 
relate, but for the only reliable data on political ma- 
chinery and other esoteric subjects with wdiich Span- 
iards could not become so well acquainted. The value 
of native records as supplementary and confirmatory 
evidence is self-evident, since they were written by 
and for the natives themselves, and naturally without 
the idea of exaggeration or deception being dominant. 
A suflficient number of original and copied native 
manuscripts or paintings exists in different museums 
and libraries, relating not only to historic events, but 
describing the nature and development of institutions 
and arts. 

Besides the actual records, many histories exist, 
by natives and friars, based wholly on such paintings 
and on traditions and personal observations, such 
as those of Tezozomoc, Camargo, and Ixtlilxochitl. 



NATIVE HISTORIANS. 19 

Each of tliese native authors wrote from a different 
standpoint, in the interest of his respective govern- 
ment. Camargo, for instance, as a Tlascaltec is bit- 
terly hostile to the Aztecs, and seeks of course to 
detract from their grandeur in order to raise his own 
people. He rather avoids dwelling on Aztec glories; 
nevertheless frequent admissions appear which help 
to confirm the impression of their advanced institu- 
tions. Ixtlilxochitl, again, writes from the family 
archives of his royal house of Tezcuco, and dwells 
upon the deeds and grandeur of his city and tribe. 
None of these authors possess sufficient skill to con- 
ceal the coloring which constitutes their chief defect 
as authorities. A number of chroniclers, and even 
modern writers like Brasseur de Bourbourg, have 
used native paintings and narratives more or less for 
their histories, while certain others, like Veytia, de- 
pend upon them or their translations almost wholly. 

Ixtlilxochitl was called by Bustamante the Cicero 
of And^huac, and of course is to be taken with allow- 
ance in speaking of his people. And so with Father 
Duran — I would no more trust a zealous priest while 
defending the natives than I would trust Morgan 
while defending his theory. 

The reliability of translators is best judged by the 
method used by Father Sahagun in the formation 
of the Historia General, the three volumes of which 
are devoted to an account of native manners and cus- 
toms, their domestic and public life, their festivals 
and rites, their institutions and traits. Instructed by 
his superiors, the friar called upon intelligent and 
learned Indians in different places to paint in hiero- 
glyphics their accounts of these subjects. To these, 
explanations were attached in full Mexican text, and 
tested by further inquiries, and then translated into 
Spanish by Sahagun. Many of the narratives are 
vague and absurd, yet these very faults point in most 
cases to simple-minded earnestness and frankness, and 
render the work rather easier for the discriminating 



20 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHROKECLERS. 

student to sift. The honesty of Sahagun's labors 
brought upon them obloquy and neglect, which only 
the more serve to commend the work to us. 

It is from such sources, original and translated 
native records, and verbal and written narrations of 
eye-witnesses, that succeeding writers, or chroniclers 
proper, obtained the main portion of their accounts 
of conquests and aboriginal institutions. They them- 
selves had opportunities for observation ; and actuated 
by different motives, they were naturally impelled to 
investigate and weigh to a certain extent, whether 
for zeal of Spanish fame, or with desire to raise the 
achievements of favorites, or to detract from the 
glories of envied or detested leaders. 

Las Casas, for instance, in his different works 
stands forward as a pronounced champion of the 
natives, and unflinchingly lashes the conquerors and 
historians for Avhat he terms cruelty, unjust policy, 
and false statement. His Historia Aj^ologetica is 
purely a defence of the Indians, their institutions and 
characteristics, and consequently to be accepted with 
caution. The need of this caution becomes stronger 
when we behold the extreme exaggerations to which 
he is led in the Breve Relaeion, claiming to be an expose 
of Spanish excesses and cruelties. In the Historia de 
las Tndias, again, he allows his feelings of friendship 
for Velazquez to detract from the achievements of 
Cortes. On every hand, therefore, the historian finds 
reasons for accepting with caution the statements of 
Las Casas; but thus forewarned, he is able to reject 
the false and determine the true. He also finds that 
when not blinded by zeal the worthy bishop is honest, 
and withal -^a keen and valuable observer, guided by 
practical sagacity and endowed with a certain genius. 

His contemporary, Oviedo, although less talented, 
is by no means deficient in knowledge, and a varied 
experience in both hemispheres had given him a 
useful insight into affairs. He is not partial to the 
natives, and Las Casas actually denounces his state- 



LAS CASAS, OVIEDO, PETER MARTYR, GOMARA. 21 

inents against them as lies. This is hardly just, ex- 
cept in some instances. While personally acquainted 
only with the region to the south of Nicaragua Lake, 
his account embraces all Spanish conquests in the 
western Indies, the facts being gathered from every 
accessible source, and either compiled or given in 
separate form. Indian and Spaniard, friend, foe, and 
rival, all receive a hearing and a record, so that his 
work is to a great extent a mass of testimony from 
opposite sides. This to the hasty reader may present 
a contradictory appearance, as Las Casas is led to 
assume, but to the student such material is valuable. 

A third contemporary and famous writer is Peter 
Martyr, a man of brilliant attainments, deep clear 
mind, and honest purpose, who had gained for him- 
self a prominent position in Spain, and even a seat in 
the Council of the Indies. Naturally interested in 
the New World, whose affairs were then unfolding, 
he eagerly questioned those who came thence, con- 
sulted their charts and reports, and was thus enabled 
to form a more accurate opinion about the Indians 
and their land than their own, based as it was on so 
much and varied testimony. A fault, however, is 
the haste with which his summaries were formed, 
both in order and detail; yet even this defect tends 
to leave the narrative unvarnished and free from a 
dangerous elaboration. Even Las Casas admits its 
credibility. 

The different minds, motives, prejudices, and even 
antagonisms, of these three writers each impart an 
additional value to their respective writings from 
which the historian cannot fail to derive benefit. 

Like Peter Martyr, Gomara took his material 
entirely from testimony, chiefly letters, reports, and 
other documents in the archives of Cortes, his patron, 
and collections to which his influence gained access. 
His high literary tastes gave a zest to his writings, 
but impelled him also to elaboration, and his Historia 
de Mexico is colored by his predilections as biographer 



22 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

of the conqueror. On the other hand, he finds en- 
dorsement in the decree which was issued against 
his production for its free treatment of government 
affairs, and comparison with other histories reveals 
the many valuable points which he has brought to 
light. The adoption of his Mexican work by so 
prominent a native as Chimalpain is to a certain ex- 
tent an assurance of its truthfulness. 

Munoz places Gomara among the first of the 
chroniclers. He had no special reason that we can 
see to extol unduly native institutions. He wrote 
early enough to know all about them, but not so early 
as to be carried away by a first enthusiasm. Made 
secretary and chaplain to Cortes in 1540, his object 
of adulation was his patron, in recounting whose 
deeds he cannot be trusted. Neither had Cortes, as 
before remarked, special interest, least of all at this 
time, in magnifying the civilization — the civilization 
he had destroyed. Alvarado and others of the chron- 
iclers were repeatedly tried by the Spanish govern- 
ment for their cruelty to the natives, whom it was 
the desire of both church and state to preserve. It 
would therefore be rather in their favor for the con- 
querors to hold them up as ignoble and low. 

The learned and elegant Antonio de Solis, though 
so bigoted as to render his deductions in many in- 
stances puerile^ and though constantly raving against 
the natives, was closely followed by both Robertson 
and Prescott. 

Herrera, the historiographer of the Indies, uses 
the material of all the preceding writers, in addition to 
original narratives, and has in' his Historia General 
the most complete account of American affairs up to 
his time. His method of massing material makes it 
most valuable, but a slavish adherence to chronology 
destroys the sequence, interferes with broad views, 
and renders the reading uninteresting. This defect is 
increased by a bald, prolix style, the effect of inexpe- 
rienced aid, and by the extreme patriotism and piety 



HERRERA, TORQUEMADA, MENDIETA 23 

■which often set aside integrity and humanity. On 
the other hand, he in some measure tempered and 
corrected the exaggerations of his predecessors. 

Torquemada was less critical in accepting material, 
but he was indefatigable in his efforts to exhaust the 
information about New Spain and her natives, and 
his Mo7iarquia Indiana is the most complete account 
extant on its combination of topics. Though an able 
work, it contains many errors ; yet the manifold sources 
of information all the more help the student to arrive 
at the truth. Torquemada amassed a great deal of 
private information about native institutions during 
the fifty years of his labor among the Indians, and 
he made use of many histories then unpublished — 
instance those of Sahagun, Mendieta, and others, 

Mendieta was an ardent champion of the natives, 
and a bitter opponent of the audiencia and govern- 
ment officials, yet in mundane affairs he possessed 
sound judgment, so much so that he was frequently 
intrusted with important missions of a diplomatic na- 
ture. He became the historian of his j^^ovincia, and 
gained the title of its Cicero. His Historia Eclesi- 
dstica, which treats chiefly of the missionary progress 
of his order, contains a great deal of matter on native 
customs, arts, and traits. 

Mendieta may be regarded as the pupil of Toribio 
de Benavente, whose humility of spirit caused him to 
adopt the name of Motolinia, applied by the Indians 
out of commiseration for his appearance. Not that 
he was very humble in all matters, as may be seen 
from his bitter attack on Las Casas. In this in- 
stance, however, he was merely an exponent of the 
hostility prevailing between the Franciscans, to which 
he belonged, and the Dominicans, which led to many 
pen contests and contradictory measures for the In- 
dians, from all of which the historian gains new facts. 
Motolinia arrived in Mexico in 1524, and wandered 
over it and the countries to the south for a series of 
,years, teaching and converting. He is claimed to have' 



24 THE EAELY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

baptized over four hundred thousand persons. His 
knowledge of the aborigines and long intercourse with 
them before their customs were changed, enabled him 
to acquire most important information about them. 
All this, together with the story of his mission work, 
is related in the Historia de los Indios de Nueva 
Espana, written in a rambling manner, with a niiive 
acceptance of the marvellous, yet bearing a stamp of 
truthfulness that wins confidence. 

Occasionally there have risen writers who, from 
excess of zeal, personal ambition, or careless study of 
facts, sought to cast doubts on native culture and 
similar topics, like De Pau and Raynal, only to evoke 
replies more or less hasty. This unsatisfactory contest 
roused the ire, among others, of the learned Jesuit 
Clavigero. Himself born in Mexico, his patriotic 
zeal was kindled, and during a residence there of 
thirty -five years, till driven forth by the general edict 
against his order, he made the ancient history and 
institutions thereof his special study. The result was 
the Storia Antica del Messico, which if less bulky than 
Torquemada's work, is far more satisfactory in its 
plan for thoroughness and clearness, and remains the 
leading authority in its field. Clavigero is generally 
admitted to have refuted the two prominent oppo- 
nents above named on the culture questions, even 
though his statements are at times colored with the 
heat of argument and with zeal for race. 

Among the remaining historians who treat on" civi- 
lized tribes may be named Acosta, who in speaking 
of Mexican culture borrows wholly from Duran, a 
Franciscan, born in New Spain of a native mother, 
and consequently predisposed in favor of his race. 
Indeed, nearly all of Duran's bulky narrative on 
ancient history and institutions is not only from native 
sources, but from a native standpoint. Vetancurt, 
who agrees mainly with Torquemada, follows both 
native and Spanish versions. Benzoni offers a good 
deal of personal observation on Central American 



OTHER WRITERS'. . 25 

Indians and affairs, but copies hearsay wlien lie 
touches on Mexico. Writers on special districts are 
also numerous. Bishop Landa wrote on Yucatan and 
its culture, and is accused of having given forth an 
invented alphabet as the Maya. Cogolludo adds much 
to his accounts, while Fuentes, Remesal, Vasquez, 
Villagutierre, and Juarros exhaust the adjoining fields 
of Chiapas and Guatemala. Thence northward the 
circle may be continued with Burgoa's works on 
Oajaca, Beaumont's on Michoacan, Mota Padilla's 
on Nueva Galicia, Arlegui's on Zacatecas, Ribas' on 
Sinaloa; and so forth. 

Descriptions of the chroniclers and their worlds 
might be carried to almost any extent, but sufficient 
has been given, I trust, to prove their testimony, 
taken as a whole, closely sifted and carefully weighed, 
to be quite as worthy of credence as that from which 
history is usually derived. I cannot throw to the 
winds such testimony in order that certain specu- 
lators may the better win converts to their fancy. 

The traducers of Aztec culture and its chroniclers 
have evidently failed in that most important point of 
carefully reading, comparing, and analyzing the author- 
ities Avhich they so recklessly condemn as a mass of 
fiction or exaggeration. It seems to me ridiculous for 
the superficial readers of a few books to criticise the 
result of such throrough researches as Prescott's, and 
even to sweep them all away with one contemptuous 
breath. I for one can testify to Prescott's general 
fairness and accuracy. His researches and writings 
are beyond all comparison with those of any modern 
theorist. Others also have read, compared, and ana- 
lyzed the authorities on Mexico, perhaps even more 
than Prescott, for fresh documents have appeared 
since his time; and while some errors and discrep- 
ancies have been discovered, yet in the main neither 
Nahua culture nor the chronicles and records de- 
scribing it can be said to have been misrepresented or 
exaggerated by him. 



26 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

The very discrepancies in the accounts of different 
chroniclers, which to the experienced observer indi- 
cate genuineness and truthfulness, are paraded by the 
superficial reader as proof of falsity. The chroniclers 
have for centuries been exposed to numerous and 
severe ordeals of critique, and their respective defects 
and merits have been widely discussed; but on the 
whole these discussions tend to confirm the state- 
ments which I have given, some of the strongest 
testimony being found in their very differences and 
blunders. Thus not even their bigotry, then so strong 
and wide-spread, their simplicity, their prejudices in 
different directions, none of these can conceal the 
truth or its main features, although occasional points 
may still remain hidden under a false coloring. The 
rigid censorship exercised in Spain over all writings 
led to the suppression of many works, but the main 
effort was to suppress heterodoxy and unfavorable 
reflections on Spanish policy, and if culture questions 
were touched, to lower the estimate thereof in order 
to cover vandalism. 

While thoroughly convinced that we have in the 
early American chroniclers a solid foundation for his- 
tory, as before stated I do not by any means accept 
as truth all they say; I do not accept half of what 
some say, while others I find it difficult to believe 
at all. Upon this basis, then — that is, on the basis 
of truth and well sifted facts — I will present a few of 
the leading characteristics of the Nahua and Maya 
peoples, sufficient in my opinion to justify their claim, 
as the world goes, to be called civilized. 

Whether those who thus affect to disbelieve in 
Aztec culture, including such men as Lewis Cass 
and H, A. Wilson, advocate an Old World origin for 
some of the advanced features does not matter, for 
there is absolutely no evidence for such origin beyond 
resemblances which may be traced between nations 
throughout the world; on the other hand, there are 



THE CITY OF MEXICO. 27 

strong internal evidences of the autoclitlionic origin 
of some of the highest features of this civihzation, 
such as hieroglyphics and many branches of the higher 
arts. Besides, the existence or non-existence of these 
advanced arts is the point in question, not whence 
they came. 

The city of Mexico presents many features of ad- 
vanced urban life under Aztec occupation, not alone 
as related by chroniclers, but as proved by incidental 
details in the account of the sieges of and by the 
Spaniards, and by the ruins. Humboldt found distinct 
traces of the old city, extending in some directions far 
beyond the present actual limits; and the numerous 
and substantial causeways which led to it for several 
miles through the lake prove that it must have been 
of great extent. The causeways, though now passing 
over dry land, are still in use, and reveal their solidity. 
Any one who will carefully read the military report 
and other accounts of the long and hard siege must 
become impressed with the vast extent and strength 
of the city; the large number and size of its temple 
pyramids affirm the same. Through an aqueduct of 
masonry several miles long it was supplied with water, 
which was distributed by pipes, and by boatmen. 
Light-houses guided the lake traffic; a large body of 
men kept the numerous canals in order, swept the 
streets, and sprinkled them. The houses were, many 
of them, large and well built. The emperor's palace 
contained many suites of rooms designed for individual 
occupation, not at all like anything in New Mexico. 
Temple -towers and turrets were frequent, proving 
that structures several stories in height were in use. 

Among the Nahuas the several branches of art 
were under control of a council or academy, with a 
view to promote development of poetry, music, oratory, 
painting, and sculpture, though chiefly literary arts, 
and to check the production of defective work. Before 
this council poems and essays were recited, and inven- 
tions exhibited. 



28 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

If distortion assumes prominence in a large class of 
models instead of ideal beauty, this must be attributed 
to the peculiarity and cruelty of certain Aztec insti- 
tutions, which stamp their traits on subjective art. 

Beauty of outline is nevertheless common, notably 
in the rich ornamentation to be seen on ruins, and 
on art relics transmitted in large numbers to Spain 
by the conquerors. The friezes or borders equal the 
Grecian in elegant outline and combination. The 
well known calendar stone contains in itself a vast 
number of beautiful designs. Some of the vases in 
the museums at Mexico and Washington surpass the 
Etruscan in beauty of form and in tasteful decora- 
tions. Again, the terra-cotta heads picked up round 
Teotihuacan, some of which I have in my possession, 
exhibit a most truthful delineation of the human face, 
with considerable expression, and are of actual beauty. 

Other admirable specimens are the female Aztec 
idol in the British Museum, the mosaic knife with its 
human figure from Christy's collection, the skin-clad 
Aztec priest, the Ethiopian granite head, the beauti- 
ful head from Mitla, and the grotesque figures from 
the Mexican gulf. Such specimens suffice to establish 
the existence of a high degree of art among the 
Nahuas. 

As for the advance exhibited by adjoining races, 
one glance at the numerous artistic designs and 
groupings on Yucatan ruins must command admira- 
tion, which rises as the observer examines the monu- 
ments at Palenque, with their extent of massive 
edifices, their advanced mode of construction, their 
galleries, their arches, their fine fagade and interior 
ornamentation, and above all, their numerous human 
figures of absolute beauty in model. This applies 
also to some terra-cotta relics from the same quarter. 

Ornamental work in gold and silver had reached a 
perfection which struck the Spaniards with admira- 
tion, and much of the metal obtained by them was 
given to native smiths to shape into models and set- 



WORK IN METALS. 29 

tings. Many pieces sent to Europe were pronounced 
superior to what Old World artists could then pro- 
duce. Birds and other animals were modelled with 
astonishinof exactness, and furnished with movable 
wings, legs, and tongues. The so-called 'lost art' of 
casting parts of the same object of different metals 
was known; thus fishes were modelled with alternate 
scales of gold and silver. Copper and other metals 
were gilded by a process which would have made the 
fortune of a goldsmith in Europe. Furnaces, perhaps 
of earthen- ware, and blowpipes, are depicted on native 
paintings in connection with gold- working. 

Although there had been but little progress in 
mining, yet a beginning appears to have been made 
to obtain metals and minerals from the solid rock, and 
melting, casting, hammering, and carving were in use 
among goldsmiths and other workers, as shown in 
native paintings. This is one of the strongest proofs 
that the Nahuas were in a progressive civilization, 
not at a stand-still nor retrograding, for such mining 
and melting methods must surely lead to the discovery 
of iron ere they stopped. Cutting implements were 
made of copper alloyed with tin, and tempered to 
great hardness. Yet stone tools were still chiefly 
used, particularly those of obsidian, from which mir- 
rors were also made, equal in reflecting power to 
those of Europe at that time, it was said. Softer 
stone being chiefly used, flint implements sufficed 
for the sculptor; yet specimens exist in hard stone. 
Precious stones were cut with copper tools, with the 
aid of silicious sand, and carved in forms of ani- 
mals. Specimens of their art m stone and metal were 
received in Europe, where chroniclers of different 
minds and impulses write in ecstasy over workman- 
ship which in so many instances surpassed in excel- 
lence that of Spain. The fabrics and feather-work 
were equally admired for fineness of texture, brilliancy 
of coloring, and beauty of arrangement and form. So 
accurate were the representations of animals in relief 



30 THE EAELY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

and drawing as to serve the naturalist Hernandez for 
models. 

The Nahua paintings show little artistic merit, be- 
cause the jSgures have necessarily to be conventional, 
for better intelligence, as w^ere the Egyptian hiero- 
glyphics. This necessity naturally cramped art. But 
while the Egyptians^ carried the conventionality even 
to sculpture and painting generally, the Nahuas clung 
to it closely only in their writings; and it needs 
but a glance at many specimens among ruins and 
relics to see that considerable skill had been reached 
in delineating even the human form and face in 
plastic material, for in painting the development was 
small. An art, however, which approached that of 
painting was the formation of designs and imitation 
of animal forms, and even faces, with feathers — feather- 
mosaic — so beautifully done that the feather-pictures 
are declared by wondering Spaniards to have equalled 
the best works of European painters. Specimens are 
still to be seen in museums. The artist would often 
spend hours, even days, in selecting and adjusting 
one feather in order to obtain the desired shade of 
color. 

Fabrics were made of cotton, of rabbit-hair, or of 
both mixed, or with feather admixture. The rabbit- 
hair fabrics were pronounced equal in finish and text- 
ure to silk. The fibres of maguey and palm leaves 
were used for coarser cloth. Paper in long narrow 
sheets was made chiefly of maguey fibres, and though 
thick, the surface was smooth. Gums appear to have 
been used for cohesion. Parchment was also used. 
Skins were tanned by a process not described, but the 
result is highly praised. In dyeing they appeared to 
have excelled Europeans, and cochineal and other 
dyes have been introduced among us from them. 
Many of their secrets in this art have since been lost. 

There is little doubt that the palaces of the rulers 
were of immense extent, and provided with manifold 
comforts and specimens of art. Numerous divisions 



NAHUA INSTITUTIONS. 31 

existed for harems, private rooms, reception and state 
rooms, guard -rooms, servants' quarter, storehouses, 
gardens, and menageries. The chroniclers speak of 
walls faced with polished marble and jasper; of balco- 
nies supported bymonoliths, of sculptures and carvings, 
of tapestry brilliant in colors and fine in texture, of 
censers with burning perfume. The admitted excel- 
lence in arts and wealth, the possession of rare stones 
and metals, permits to some extent the belief in a 
Hall of Gold, Koom of Emeralds, and so forth, which 
the chroniclers place within the palaces. 

The menagerie at Mexico was large and varied, and 
the many beautifully laid out gardens in all parts of 
the country, some devoted to scientific advancement, 
denote a high status in natural history. 

Throughout the narratives of the chroniclers the 
Aztec ruler receives the title of emperor, which it was 
not the custom of the conquerors to give unadvisedly. 
It was almost a sacred title in their eyes, their own 
sovereign being so called, and they were not likely to 
apply that title to a common Indian chief. Indeed, 
the native records relate that Montezuma II. after 
many conquests assumed the title emperor, or ruler, 
of the world. In two of the Nahua kingdoms the 
succession was lineal and hereditary, and fell to the 
eldest legitimate son, those born of concubines or 
lesser wives being passed over. In Mexico election 
prevailed, but the choice was restricted to one family. 
The system resembled very much that of the electoral 
German empire. Each of these rulers was expected 
to confer with a council, the number and composition 
of whose members are not quite satisfactorily estab- 
lished. Executive government was intrusted to regu- 
larly appointed officials and tribunals. In Tlascala a 
parliament composed of the nobility and headed by 
the four lords determined the affairs of government. 

The native records indicate a number of classes and 
orders among nobles, officials, and warriors. The. 
highest were the feudal lords, as in Tezcuco, whose 



32 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

position corresponded very much to that of the mighty 
baron of Germanyin former times, all kept from defying 
the supreme ruler by a balancing of power, by private 
jealousies, and later by the ruler increasing their num- 
bers, and thus closely attaching to himself a large pro- 
portion, and by obliging others to constantly reside in 
the capital, either to form a council or on other pre- 
tences. Another means for controlling the haughty 
feudal lord, and indeed a step toward abolishing their 
power, was to divide the kingdom into sixty-five de- 
partments, whose governors were nearly all creatures 
of the king. The population of certain districts was 
moved in part to other districts, or made to receive 
inwanderers, both operations tending to give the king 
greater control. Instances of such master-strokes of 
policy as are related in aboriginal records serve to 
show the power of the monarch and the advanced 
system of government. 

In Mexico the people had had access in a great 
measure to military, civil, and court offices, but with 
the enthronement of Montezuma II. the nobles man- 
aged to obtain exclusive access to nearly all dignities. 
This reform naturally served to alienate the people 
and to aid in the downfall of the empire. 

The list of royal officials is imposing in its length, 
and is vouched for not only by the minute account of 
the titles and duties of the dignitaries, but by the 
many incidental allusions to them and their acts in 
the native records of events. The list embraces offices 
corresponding to minister of war, who was also com- 
mander-in-chief, minister of finance, grand master of 
ceremonies, grand chamberlain, superintendent of arts, 
etc. There were also military orders, corresponding 
to the knights of mediaeval Europe, while the church 
had its gradations of priests, guardians, deacons, friars, 
nuns, and probationers. 

Several tribunals existed, each with a number of 
appointed judges and a staff of officials; and appeals 
could be carried from one to the other, and finally to 



JUDICIARY AND LAND TENURE. 33 

the supreme judge, who was without a colleague. In 
the wards were elected magistrates, who judged minor 
cases in the first instance, and an inferior class of 
justices, assisted by bailiffs and constables. Some 
courts had jurisdiction over matters relating only to 
taxes and their collectors, others over industries and 
arts. Cases were conducted with the aid not alone of 
verbal testimony under oath, but of paintings, repre- 
senting documents; and names, evidence, and decisions 
were recorded by clerks. Whether advocates were 
employed is not clear, but the judges were skilled in 
cross-examination, and many a perjury was proved, 
followed by the penalty of death. Suits were limited 
to eighty days. Bribery was strictly forbidden. The 
judges were selected from the higher class, the superior 
from relatives of the kings, and held office f&r life, 
sustained by ample revenues. Adultery and similar 
crimes were severely punished. 

Land was divided in different proportions, the 
largest owned by king and nobles, and the remainder 
by the temples and communities of the people. All 
such property was duly surveyed, and each estate 
accurately marked on maps or paintings, kept on file 
by district officials. Each class of landed estate had 
then its distinctive color and name, and from each 
owner or tenant was exacted tribute in product or 
service, regular or occasional. Portions of the crown 
land were granted to usufructuaries and their heirs 
for service rendered and to be rendered. In con- 
quered provinces a certain territory was set aside for 
the conqueror and cultivated by the people for his 
benefit. The estates of the nobles were, many of 
them, of ancient origin, and often entailed, which fact 
establishes to a certain extent the private ownership 
of land. These feudatories paid no rent, but were 
bound to render service to the crown with person, 
vassals, and property, when called upon. The people's 
land belonged to the wards of the towns or villages, 
with perpetual and inalienable tenure. Individual 

£ssAxs AND Miscellany. 3 



34 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

members of the ward were on demand assigned por- 
tions for use, and could even transmit the control 
thereof to heirs, but not sell. Certain conditions 
must be observed for the tenure of such lands, and 
the observance was watched over by a council of 
elders or its agents. 

There is much in this to confirm the resemblances 
to the feudal system of Europe already noticed. The 
exactness of the information on land tenure is con- 
firmed by investigations instituted under auspices of 
the Spanish government with a view to respect the 
rights of the natives, so far as the claims of con- 
querors and settlers permitted. Cortes obtained from 
the native archives and officials copies of the estate 
maps, and tax lists, by which he was guided in hia 
distribution of land and collection of tribute. 

In the department of the minister of finance, and 
in the offices of the numerous tax collectors, were kept 
hieroglyphic lists of the districts, towns, and estates, 
designating the kind and quantity of tax to be paid 
by each, in product or service. A copy of such a list 
is given by Lorenzana, and others are reproduced in 
the Codex Mendoza, and other collections. Certain 
cities had to supply the palaces with laborers and ser- 
vants, food and furniture, fabrics and other material; 
others paid their service and products regularly to 
the finance department, or when called upon. Manu- 
facturers and merchants paid in the kind they pos- 
sessed, and artisans often in labor. The tenants of 
nobles tilled land for their own benefit, and paid 
rent in a certain amount of labor for the landlord, 
and in military service when called upon; besides 
this, they paid tribute in kind to the crown, the pro- 
duce being stored away in magazines in the nearest 
towns. 

There were nearly four hundred tributary towns 
in the Mexican empire, some paying taxes several 
times a month, others less often, and still others only 
once a year, the amount being in many instances over 



COMMERCE AND SOCIETY. 35 

a third of everything produced. Custom-houses also 
existed for exacting duties. 

In the capitals of the provinces resided chief treas- 
urers, each with a corps of collectors, who not only en- 
forced the payment of taxes but watched that lands 
were kept under cultivation and industries generally 
maintained. 

To illustrate the extent to which organization en- 
tered into the affairs of life, we can point to the mer- 
chants, with their guilds, apprenticeship, caravans, 
markets, fairs, agencies, and factories in distant re- 
gions. Tlatelulco was renowned for her trade and 
vast market, and her merchants really formed a 
commercial corporation controlling the trade of the 
country. Sahagun's records sketch the development 
of this company. Maps guided them in their journeys, 
tribunals of their own regulated affairs, and different 
articles were accepted as a medium for exchange, in- 
cluding copper and tin pieces, and gold-dust. The 
market at Tlatelulco, in the vast extent of booths, 
and of articles for sale, and in its regulations, was a 
source of wonder to the Spaniards. Couriers and 
inns existed to aid travel and intercourse; also roads, 
well kept and often paved, such as late exploration 
in Yucatan shows to have connected distant cities. 
In navigation the Mexicans were less advanced 

One lawful wife was married with special ceremo- 
nies, and her children were the onl}'' legitimate issue. 
Three additional classes of mates were admissible: 
those bound to the man with less solemn ceremonies, 
and bearing the title of wife, like the legitimate one, 
yet deprived of inheritance or nearly so, together with 
their children; those bound with no ceremonies, and 
ranking merely as concubines; and those who co- 
habited with unmarried men, and who might be 
married by their lovers or by other men. These two 
classes of concubines were not entitled to the respect 
accorded to the first-named, yet no dishonor attached 
to their condition. Public prostitutes were tolerated 



36 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

as a necessary evil. This is a social condition which 
needs not for its justification to seek a parallel among 
other nations recognized as civilized, nor among the 
European princes who publicly maintained the same 
classes of consorts and mistresses. 

Schools existed in connection with the temple, under 
control of the priests, and in Mexico every quarter had 
its school for the common people, after the manner 
of our public schools. Higher schools or colleges 
existed for sons of nobles and those destined for the 
priesthood, wherein were taught history, religion, 
philosophy, law, astronomy, writing, and interpreting 
hieroglyphics, singing, dancing, use of arms, gymnas- 
tics, and many arts and sciences. A result of this 
high training may be found in the many botanical 
and zoological collections in the country, and the pro- 
motion of art in sculpture, weaving, feather orna- 
ments, and jewelry, by the nobles and the wealthy. 

Picture-writing is practised to a certain extent by 
all savages, both in representative and symbolic form, 
but it is only by studying the art, or following its 
development to a higher grade, that it acquires per- 
manent value, or can be made the means to gain for 
its possessors the culture stamp of keeping records, 
and records were kept by the Nahuas. They had ad- 
vanced to some extent even in the phonetic form of 
picture-writing, but had not reached the alphabetic 
grade. Any codex will show in abundance the repre- 
sentative and symbolic signs, and some that are pho- 
netic. In religious and astrologic documents the signs 
vary so greatly that the theory has been strongly 
asserted that the priests used a partially distinct 
symbolic system for certain records. When studying 
church forms under the missionaries the natives used 
phonetic signs to aid their memory in remembering 
abstract words, a method also recognized in the pre- 
served paintings for designation of names. The sys- 
tem is apparently of native origin. The Maya writing 
is still more phonetic in its character. 



HISTORY AND ASTRONOMY. 3? 

The Naliua records, in hieroglyphic characters, in- 
clude traditional and historical annals, with names and 
genealogic tables of kings and nobles, lists and tribute 
rolls of provinces and towns, land titles, law codes^ 
court records, calendar, religious rules and rites, edu- 
cational and mechanical processes, etc. The hiero- 
glyphic system was known in its ordinary application 
to the educated classes, while the priests alone under- 
stood it fully. The characters were painted in bright 
colors, on long strips of paper, cloth, or parchment, or 
carved in stone. Original specimens on stone and 
paper or skin exist to prove the efficiency of the sys- 
tem for all ordinary requirements, and to establish for 
the race that high index of culture, the possession of 
written annals. The Spanish authorities for a long 
time had to appeal to them to settle land and other 
suits, and to fix taxes, etc. The several codices in 
European libraries and museums, with their early and 
recent interpretation, have added much valuable ma- 
terial to ancient history; Ixtlilxochitl and others built 
their histories mainly on such paintings. 

The Nahuas were well acquainted with the move- 
ments of the sun, moon, and of some planets, and 
observed and recorded eclipses, though not attributing 
them to natural causes. Their calendar divided time 
into ages of two cycles, each cycle consisting of four 
periods of thirteen years, the years of each cycle being 
distinctly designated by signs and names with num- 
bers, in orderly arrangement, as shown on their sculpt- 
ured stones. The civil year Avas divided into eighteen 
months of twenty days, with five extra days to com- 
plete the year; and each month into four sections 
or weeks. Extra days were also added at the end of 
the cycle, so that our calculations are closely ap- 
proached. The day was divided into fixed periods 
corresponding to hours. All the above divisions had 
their signs and names. The ritual calendar was lunar, 
Avith twenty weeks of thirteen days for the year, all 
differing in their enumeration, though the names of 



?8 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

the days were the same as in the solar calendar. The 
system of nmneration was simple and comprehensive, 
without limit to the numbers that could be expressed; 
and so were the signs for them. It was essentially 
decimal. 

These are some few instances of Nahua culture 
which might easily be extended to fill a volume after 
all exaggeration has been thrown out; and all this, 
be it remembered, was the condition of thinsfs four 
hundred years ago. Compare it with the European 
civilization or semi-civilization of that day on the one 
hand, and with the savagism of the Iroquois and 
Ojibways on the other, and then judge which of the 
tvi^o it most resembled. 



It is with regret that I find myself obliged to speak of two reviews of the 
first vein me of my History of the Pacific States. They were so different iu 
tone and temper from two hundred others appearing about the same time, as 
to excite in the mind of an ordinary observer suspicion of a hidden motive. 
I think I shall have no difficulty in showing what that motive was; in which 
case it will not leave either the reviewers, or the editors admitting to their 
columns such articles, in a very favorable light among fair-minded men. 

I first heard of Lewis H. Morgan as a person going about from one re- 
viewer to another begging condemnation for my Native Races. His object 
I could not imagine. Some time afterward one of these reviewers, whose 
letter I still have, wrote me regretting the circumstance, for though a fol- 
lower of Morgan he was an honorable man, and gave my book conscientious 
treatment. Later I learned that Morgan was angry because I omitted his 
book from my list of authorities, and did not subscribe to his doctrine. The 
book was not in my possession at the time, and I had never heard of his 
theory. I regarded the matter as of little moment, and soon it dropped 
from my mind. I certainly entertained no feeling for or against Mr Morgan ; 
and as for his theory, when making a summary of forty or fifty others, none 
of which I was prepared fully to accept, and desiring the catalogue to be as 
complete as possible, I would hardly have left out his because of my inability 
to believe it all. This is yet more apparent in view of the fact that I have no 
conflicting theory of my own, that I object to no one's fancies, and that I 
regard the Morgan hypothesis as exceedingly innocent, except where it at- 
tempts the overthrow of material truths. I cannot entertain a belief in 
opposition to the testimony of my senses ; I cannot support an unprovable 
proposition as against a provable one. Nor did I take exceptions to Morgan's 
notice of the Natire Races in the North American Review. It was open; the 
portions objected to were arrayed and combated, and the other portions were 
not generally slurred. He did not attack the author in a sweeping way, 



SCIENCE-FANATICS. 39 

while attempting to bring him into disrepute by artfully covering the real 
cause of his antagonism. In this respect he was a better man than some of 
his successors. 

The years passed by with but little thought on my part upon these things. 
Occasionally one of my assistants would call attention to a work by one of 
the Morgan school, in which traces of a free use of the Native Races were 
plainly visible without a word of credit. To such slights, however, I am not 
at all sensitive. It is the primary object of all my efforts that they may be 
of use to the world. The matter of credit is an exceedingly small one, to be 
left to the taste and sense of justice of the person using it. For myself I 
prefer to cite my sources of information fully, as my pages show. I certainly 
never obtained any information or ideas from the men of Morgan that I did 
not "give them credit for. In the present instance we survived the heavy 
blow, and were glad if the shade of the great chief could be thus appeased. 

For meanwhile Morgan had departed to his happy hunting-ground, and in 
his place had arisen a school of followers, among whom, as is usual in such 
cases, there were fanatics seven times more the children of darkness than had 
been the master. The more radical of these seized upon the weird fancies 
that sometime floated through the brain of their dead chief and wove them 
into what they regarded as tangible realities, while others accepted Morgan's 
hypotheses only in i^art. Happy indeed must have been that great soul which 
from its celestial wilderness beheld the cloud of dust that it had raised ! The 
speculations contained in his works now to some became words of inspiration, 
and the -writer himself the founder of a new faith. There was to be a new 
departure in science, literature, and art ; learning was to be revolutionized ; 
and the originator of the new doctrine, which was a true revelation from 
heaven, was to be deified. All who accepted his words were to be received 
in due time into the happy hunting-ground ; all who did not were anathema 
maranatha. 

We must not wonder too greatly at the occasional foolishness of wise men. 
There are those high in position, able and learned in some directions, who are 
shallow-pated enough in others. It is not out of the ordinary course of 
things to find among Morgan's disciples some learned and able men. How- 
ever we may wonder at it, the proposition is none the less true, that there 
never has been set on foot a doctrine so illogical or a dogma so absurd as not 
to find adherents and champions among the so-called wise of this world. 
There is no question that to-day, as at any time since men were made, there 
cannot be concocted a system of theology so extravagant but that supporters 
may be found for it among the studious. It has always been so, and judging 
from present appearances it will always be so. It is not necessary to cite 
examples; history is full of them. The very fact that the proposition is 
unreasonable prompts some to lay aside their reason. The more acute and 
powerful the mind, the more studious it may become over unprovable hy- 
potheses, and the more forced to resort to strange conceits and wild delusions. 
Take the sages of antiquity and tell me what the opinions entertained by 
them upon the origin of things and the future state of man are worth to 
the world to-day. Peradventure some of the followers of Morgan may be so 
fortunate as to be classed a thousand years hence among the sages of antiquity. 



40 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 

Without referring to tlife close students of alchemy or astrology for examples, 
or stopping to consider the effect of the application of brain power to tradi- 
tional formulas, v/e have only to notice the totally opposite views taken on 
every problem of life and death by the foremost intellects of the age to be 
aware that it is possible for the modern scholar to entertain views favorable to 
the subordination of sense to aboriginal consanguinities. Nor is the success of 
a new delusion according to the measure of its subtilities, or governed by the 
plausibility of its hypotheses; it will be believed according to the force with 
which it is proclaimed. The nature of the scheme presented and the power 
of discrimination on the part of the recipient have less to do with its promul- 
gation than the teacher's strength of brain and body. This accounts for our 
finding among the followers of Morgan some intelligent and able men, some 
who occupy conspicuous positions, and are looked up to as models of refined 
human intelligence. The very strength and elasticity of the mind accepting 
fancy as a substitute for fact often plunge the possessor farther and farther 
iilto the mazes of infatuation. It is not always proof of a proposition that 
an able mind entertains it. The savage can see as far into a granite bowlder 
as the sage. 

Thus it will be seen that for several years I rested under the wrath of 
Morgan's men withovit knowing it. At length the first volume of 'my History 
was published. This was the hour of sweet revenge ! It had not been unlocked 
for, nor were the holy brotherhpod unprepared. Allusion in a bibliographi- 
cal note to the folly of throwing to the winds testimony as good as that upon 
which rests the history of any nation, was sulficient to rouse the refined demon 
of the new dispensation. "This book must be put down, the author annihi- 
lated: we have jDraised him hitherto; now we will sapiently sit upon him. 
For if his work be permitted to stand, ours must fall ; if his chronicles are 
to remain as recognized foundations of American history, then our beloved 
dogma must be buried. " He who formerly was a man of independent thought 
and action, a patient laborer in a praiseworthy field, winning the approbation 
of eastern and European scholars, is now an upstart, a presumptuous fellow, 
unworthy to touch the sacred garments of this guild. His formerly intelli- 
gent and able assistants are now sneered at and ridiculed ; the very richness 
of his materials, the handling of which elicited wonder, is now transformed 
into a great gulf which in due time is to swallow this huge Californian under- 
taking. Of this concerted and predetermined course of action, in effect, I 
was credibly informed. 

For their first shot the columns of the New York Independent were used. 
The attack was so vehement, however, as to defeat its own purpose. It was 
clearly apparent that fairly to point out the merits and demerits of the work 
was not the writer's purpose, but on the contrary to hide all that was good, 
distort the truth, and magnify trivial matters so that they should appear 
great faults ; and to the thoughtful reader the wonder was if either the writer 
of the article or the editor of the journal ever had been taught to distinguish 
right and wrong or carried a conscience. What an egregious blunder the 
leading journals of New York and Boston, of Chicago, St Louis, Cincinnati, 
and San Francisco, to say nothing of those of Europe — what a blunder they 
had made in reviewing this volume to speak well of it ! I do not suppose the 



MENDACIOUS JOURNALISM. 41 

editor of the Independent wishes to plead ignoi-ance for admitting sweeping 
and untruthful denunciation and attempting to pass it off on his readers as 
fair criticism, which would be equivalent to an acknowledgment on his part 
of his unfitness for the position, or that he would admit himself to be capable 
of wilful misrepresentation in printing what he knew to be false, which course 
would be to place himself outside the category of good men ; yet one or the 
other of these positions he is bound to take. 

I do not propose to follow this reviewer and notice his misstatements ; the 
article cannot be placed in the category of reputable criticism. It was simply 
mud-throwing. I will point out a few features of it, however, that we may 
see how the thing is done. "It was a very difficult book to review," the 
editor remarked afterward, "a very difficult book. There were but few who 
would imdertake it." So it would seem; and the one who did undertake it 
was not long in showing his ignorance of the subject. First, no criticism was 
attemj)ted of the history proper ; not a word was said about it in the whole 
five columns of disparagement. One half of the article was devoted to a 
general tiuade against the book, and personal abuse of the author; the other 
half was given to astute hair-splitting over a summary of voyages, printed in 
fine type, not directly connected with the subject of the volume, and wherein 
the author expressly disavows the intention to make it exhaustive. Here in 
some cases the reviewer was right but not original, for he always artfully 
concealed the fact that the note was not offered as an exhaustive treatise on 
American geography, but simply as a r6sum6 from a dozen well known author- 
ities named. While endeavoring to convey the idea of gross inaccuracy, he 
failed to show that I did not do accurately everything that I attempted. 

There is notliing which so enrages an erudite dogmatist as to meet an 
opinion positively expressed in direct opposition to his own positive opinion. 
And the more extravagant the doctrine, the more enraged is the biassed mind 
over it. It is not simply the real and tangible that men most dispute, but the 
hypothetical and unknowable. It requires no discussion to prove the presence 
of the palpable, but for the impalpable men will lay down their lives. Pure, 
unreasoning, and unreasonable fantasy has set on foot most of the battles of 
the world. Men fight over fancies, not facts. 

Another article of similar import appeared in the New York Post and 
Nation. Hecognizing the excess of zeal on the part of the Independent re- 
viewer, the Po&t article between its spasms of spleen threw in clauses of 
praise. I would advise the Morgan men to exercise care in their commenda- 
tions, else every evil charge they make will be contradicted by one member 
or another of the guild, and thus their united efforts fall to the ground. An 
air of moderation is here assumed, but only that the book may be damaged 
the more. A number of the Morgan men are mentioned by name as martyrs 
to science, victims of my crushing silence. The ignorance of the reviewer in 
regard to Pacific coast history, of which he pretends to know so much more 
than one who has made it the special study of a lifetime, is nowhere more 
clearly shown than when complaining of the omission from my list of au- 
thorities of certain of the men of Morgan. The works of two of the writers 
named appeared among the authorities for the Native Races; one was omitted 
as already explained ; the rest wrote on ethnological and antiquarian topics, 



42 THE EARLY AMERICAN" CHRONICLERS. 

after the list was printed, and I may be excused for not foreseeing their 
investigations. Of course they do not appear in the list for the History of 
Central America, for the good reason that not one of them so far as I know- 
has written a word on the subject ! The article closes with a few flat denials 
of any Aztec or Maya cultui-e, the common argument of the school. 

A fit sequel to the Post article was the admission into its columns, of cer- 
tain statements by an irresponsible and unprincipled person, who with a view 
of extorting money or obtaining notoriety, concocted a series of falsehoods, 
intermingled with facts so warped as to make them appear to my disadvan- 
tage, all which if true would amount to nothing. It was my method of writ- 
ing history that troubled him, poor fellow, and he thought my assistants were 
imposed upon. But after all he was but an auxiliary of the Post, and with 
such a person I have no issue. There are always at hand those who for money 
or notoriety will not hesitate to concoct lies, and labor with others to make 
them appear plausible, as this person has done. If my work or my reputa- 
tion rested on a sandy foundation, if I feared him in the least, or the Post, 
or the men of Morgan, perhaps I should have paid him his price and stopped 
his bark. As it was I desired the matter should go on; I preferred to know, 
what they were trying to do, what they expected to gain by it all, and if 
indeed by such means I and my work could be brought to grief. 

Charges like these, and emanating from such a source, were as I said a fit 
sequel to the first attack, and very properly admitted into his columns by the 
editor. "First we will condemn the book, and then annihilate the author; 
so that there shall be none in all the earth to stand before the men of Morgan. " 
A prominent New York publisher denied the statements for me as palpably 
false ; but he need not have taken the trouble. There was not a subscriber 
of ordinary intelligence but saw through the editor's artifice by this time. 
He had admitted from one of the men of Morgan a defamatory article, and 
now a few more stalwart strokes and the western coast of North America 
would be overturned into the sea. It only lacked some such effusions as 
these from this most worthy coadjutor to show the real purpose of the paper 
in admitting the review. But for this proceeding on the part of the editor 
there might have been some who really would have thought that the reviewer 
had intended to be sincere regarding his very intelligent and learned remarks 
about the book. I will admit that the ethics which obtain in such cases, par- 
ticularly the Posfs morality, are beyond me; but I will say that in commercial 
matters, a man who showed such an utter disregard for truth and fair conduct . 
as did the editor of the Post in this case, would be ruled out of any respectable 
society of merchants. The responsibility cannot be thrown upon the accom- 
plice under cover of communications. It was the admission of the false state- 
ments into the columns of the journal that did the injury, and not the writing 
of them. And this editor knew them in the main to be false ; or if he had en- 
tertained doubts, he might easily have ascertained the truth; but from the 
course of proceedings it seems evident that truth was exactly what he did 
not want. During a business career lasting from boyhood I have been well 
known both on the Pacific coast and at the east, and neither my life nor 
my acts have been hidden or secret. My Library and its details have always 
been open to the public, and my system has been a thousand times ex- 



MY METHOD OF WEITING HISTORY. 43 

plained, verbally and in the newspapers and magazines ; and before publish- 
ing a volume I personally visited the leading literary men at the east, laid 
before them the scheme with my plan for its accomplishment, and received 
their warm commendations, ample proof of which I can produce both from 
the persons themselves, and from their letters in my possession. 

My historical iind^rtakings are such as in all civilized and half-civilized 
societies are deemed important. For this western coast if the work was ever 
to be fully done it must be done at once, as mnch valuable knowledge was daily 
dropping out of existence, and there was no government or society ■at hand 
ready to save it. Nor would gathering alone satisfy me. It seemed evident 
that unless I went on and placed the large unwieldy mass in form available 
to the world, it would be long before any one else would do so. 

Whoever or whatever the author may be, there are points about the work 
which truth cannot gainsay. Among these are diligence in collecting ma- 
terial, and great thoroughness in correctly bringing out all the facts and 
arranging them in natural sequence. That this is true, and that vast stores 
of information would but for me have been lost, and that no such work has 
been done for other nations, can be made clear to any ordinary mind. And 
this as I regard it, is nine tenths of history. Style, ways of working, the use 
of big words or little words, and like matters of comparatively minor moment 
may always be distorted into material for ridicule ; though in my own case 
even here, where one man has spoken evil, fifty, ay a hundred, each as capable 
of judging truly as are my learned friends of the Post, have expressed approval. 
' My plan of historical labor is my own, and grew out of the necessities of 
the case; the collection was made and the work begun and carried on by 
myself alone, without government or other aid, or any thought of it. ,, The 
importance of the work itself it is impossible to estimate too highly; and 
that I ask or desire from the public any consideration for myself further than 
I deserve is so preposterous, the idea of it so repugnant to my nature, so 
inconsistent with a life of retirement and self-sacrifice, that I should have 
paid no attention to these slanders had they not come from so-called respect- 
able sources. { The proposition was simply this : In order to accomplish within 
a lifetime the labor for one man of two hundred years assistants must be 
employed. My work is not of that quality that one man could do it in forty 
or fifty years. I could do much, but not all. Every one knows that it is 
more difficult to do work by the hand of anotlier than by one's own hand. 
My assistants are my friends, my pride, and I never was capable of depreci- 
ating their merits in order to exalt my own. My work is peculiar. It is 
drawTi almost wholly from raw material, not such as has before been worked 
over twenty times as was the material used by writers like Hume, Gibbon, 
and Macaulay, and it cannot justly be made subject to the same standard of 
criticism. The attempt to make finished and standard history, upon an ex- 
tensive scale, out of crude, unworked material, is something new, and the 
effort might at least be regarded with common charity, ^i Nevertheless, the 
actual defects pointed out by my assailants were few and insignificant. "If 
that is all the fault they can find," said one of my assistants, "it must be 
regarded as a great compliment. " It is the propensity to inflict injury under 
false pretences alone that I deplore. 



/ 



,k 



44 THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS. 



■ My assistants are occupied''for the most part in abstracting and preparing 
material. After long experience some of them are able to furnish me manu- 
script in a more or less advanced state, and of their highest services I gladly 
avail myself. The burden of the work, however, falls on me where it rightly 
belongs. For the past fourteen years I iiave devoted on an average more 
• than eight hours a day to my literary work, and at least one half of the 
manuscript has been written by my own hand, and the remainder has been 
so rewritten and revised by me as to make it my own. I did not rewrite 
what was perfectly satisfactory to me merely for the sake of rewriting; I 
could employ my time to greater advantage. Very little of the manuscript 
as it comes to me, whether in the form of rough material or more finished 
chapters, is the work of one person alone. If after collecting the material at 
a vast outlay of time and money, making a plan of the work, writing all the 
kading parts alone and unaided, training assistants after innumerable failures 
and discouragements to help me handle the immense mass, otherwise wholly 
beyond the strength and control of one man, meanwhile paying them fairly 
for their services as the work went on— if after this I deemed it my duty to 
account for every line or page, which I certainly did not, to whom should I 
credit the work: to the indexer, or to the note-taker, or to the one who did 
the arranging, or to the one who put it into the rough form, or to the one who 
rearranged and rewrote some portions and divided it into chapters, all these 
several parts having been accomplished by different persons at diflferent times; 
or to myself, who besides conceiving and carrying forward the work thus far, 
supplementing my labors by the help of others, and being alone responsible 
for the result, must now make it yet more completely my own by careful 
study, rewriting, revising, adding, eliminating, absolutely the hardest and 
most wearing labor a literary man can find to do — who is the author of this 
work I ask? 

Still another set of men compare every statement, after it is in type, with 
the original authority, while yet others draw the maps, prepare the lists of 
authorities, and make the index:. And of this I am sure: call the method by 
any name you please, there is nothing secret, thei'e is nothing counterfeit 
about it. I should like to see those who sneer at my efforts prod\ice equiva- 
^y lent results by this or any other means. Of course I should be better 
satisfied if I could do all the work myself, including even the indexing 
and note-taking. It is what I do that I take pleasure in, and not what 
others do for me ; but owing to the magnitude of the work, and having but 
the remnant of one short life-time before me, such a course was not pos- 
sible. It has ever been my greatest happiness to recognize the merits of 
my assistants. Though they have not been my teacher I have learned from 
them and honor them,'; Some of them have been my almost daily associates 
during the entire term of my literary efforts. Among them are my most 
valued and devoted friends, and it is not true that I have ever assumed 
aught rightfully belonging to them. Often have they attempted to restrain 
me in my public acknowledgments of their merits. I glory in them, in what 
they are doing and can do; and it is with pride that I can say that were I to 
die to-morrow, they could and would fairly enough finish my work. I say 
there is no attempted secrecy about my work as has been implied, and I am 



BEUTUM FULMEK 45 

not conscious of pretending to be other than I am. Results are more to me 
than means, but results are valueless if the means are questionable. The 
name of having performed what I deem a most important task is of small 
moment to me as compared with its being well and faithfully done. 

But why continue ? Surely the evidence is clear enough that I and my 
labors are condemned by these men for no other reason than that I do not 
support the Morgan doctrine. Else why, as I before observed, have but two 
journals thus far assumed this tone of jeering at what is universally admitted 
as well-directed effort? After all it may be thought that I should be satisfied 
in coming before the world with so pretentious a work with receiving but 
two generally unfavorable criticisms against two hundred favorable ones. 
But that is not the point. Criticism I do not object to if made in a spirit 
of fairness. Were this the case I would not give out my volumes to review. 
No one is more my friend than he who in good faith iDoints out my defects 
that I may remove them. No one will go further than I to avoid or rectify 
mistakes, and to follow the right in all subjects that come up for investi- 
gation. 

No doubt it is presumption on the part of one not of this fold to attempt 
to write history; and when the work undertaken is not upon the scale to 
which they are accustomed, or performed in the ordinary way, the author 
must be put down. 

C Finally, I would ask : If these statements are true, and I believe I have at 
hand the proofs of all I have said, would it not be well to receive with some 
degree of allowance the criticisms printed in the columns of such papers as 
have fallen under the sway of these science-fanatics ? 'i I appeal to the editors 
and reviewers of the world to say if the quality of journalism thus dispensed 
by the New York Independent and the New York Post is reputable ; I appeal 
to the fair-minded of the world to say if the proceedings of these reviewers 
and editors can be called honorable. It is time this low cheating and chi- 
canery was done away with in criticism. Those who will make the review- 
ing of a book a cloak to cover a malicious spirit should be condemned by 
all good men. 

I do not expect this to be the last of it. The men of Morgan will con- 
tinue their assaults as occasions offer, fighting from behind stones and trees 
after the manner of Indians. Nor do I wish them to stop, as I said before; 
I have a curiosity to see what will come of it, to what further lengths they 
■will go. I will endeavor to live through it all ; and I trust this explanation 
to my friends and the world will forever suffice, so that whatever attitude 
my assailants may assume, or whatever else they may concoct, I shall not be 
obliged again to reply to them. 



METHODS OF LITERARY WORK. 

from the San Francisco Bulletin. 

' ' Certain commentaries and criticisms which have appeared of late, not so 
much about literary production as the methods of literary work, strike us as 
not only lacking in the judicial quaUty of temper, but as going altogether be- 
yond the province of fair criticism, and becoming merely impertinent com- 
ments. When a gentleman goes to the table of his host, the dishes may or 
may not be to his liking. But he has no business with the process by which 
the cook prepared the dishes. His nose thrust into the kitchen is an imperti- 
nence, for which he should be soundly snubbed. When it comes to literature, 
the fair-minded critic has nothing to do with the processes by which any 
particular work has been produced. He deals with the quality only. He may 
be interested in the fact that Hawthorne produced his most brilliant romance 
while holding a political office, and was daily giving attention to the affairs of 
the Salem Custom House ; or that Charles Lamb was a clerk, sitting on his 
stool during business hours in the office of the East India Company; or that 
Napoleon III. had a corps of paid writers and investigators to help him in 
bringing out his Life of Julius Ccesar; or that the greater number of poems 
written by Bryant, and nearly all his literary work were performed while he 
was editor of a leading newspaper, and was every day doing his work in the 
editorial office. Biit these incidents are never lugged in to depreciate literary 
work ; or if done at all, it is by some ca^Dtious or impertinent popinjay who 
does not know the pro\dnce of honest criticism. The irresponsible Ishmaelite 
who whacks right and left may hope to make a mark in that way, but the 
mark is rather that which he makes upon himself, and which in the long run 
becomes repugnant to those who have some correct notions of intellectual 
honesty. 

' ' Not long since the Nation had a criticism of a volume which had been 
written by an author on this coast. The writer went behind his knowledge of 
the book to hint, at least, about the methods of its production. The merits of 
the volume itself were a fairer subject for criticism. Within this limit, even 
the harshest comment must be tolerated. For no matter how stinging the 
blow is, if it is fairly dealt, it is to be accepted in good faith. There is this 
also to be said, that no unfavorable criticism ever permanently injured a 
meritorious work. The author can afford to have any amount of adverse 
criticism, so that the writer is decently honest, however much he maybe mis- 
taken in his judgment. Nor is it likely that the impertinence which meddles 
with his methods of literary production — the number of hours he is engaged 
in other pursuits outside of the work of authorship, the number of offices or 
places of business he may have, the number of persons on his pay roll, the 
checks he may sign, the amount of copy he may revise — will do him much 



METHODS OF LITERARY WORK. 

hurt. When a book is iDublished, the judgment of a discriminating public is 
challenged as to its merits. They may like it or not. Its merits and defects 
are legitimate subjects of comment. The critic is not invited to his back- 
room, nor to share any business or literary confidence. Here is so much v^ork. 
The i^lan, design, character, years of preliminary labor, collection of docu- 
ments, and all that relates to the execution of the work, has been conceived 
by one man. The critic has nothing to do with his early literary qualifications, 
whether he was a blacksmith, basket-maker, dealer in second-hand clothes, 
pawnbroker, or a bookseller by early occupation. The irrepressible Philistine, 
for the very reason that he is not an honest critic, will go beyond and dwell 
on these immaterial circumstances. Personal and confidential knowledge 
would be used, and the bushwacker miglit even go further and tell the jjublic 
what the writer had daily for his dinner, whether he paid his market bills 
promptly, his laundryman and baker, what wages he paid to his employes, 
and so on. 

"All this might be greatly relished as gossip, but it is not legitimate 
criticism. It belongs rather to the department of literary mendicancy. There 
are days of literary puppyhood before the juvenile teeth are shed, when these 
excrescences are expected ; but in a more mature stage of development, we 
expect better things. No fair judgment, and none which is worth a rush, can 
be made up on the trivial and immaterial circumstances of authorship. Nor 
is it a matter of the least concern as to the way in which a writer has come by 
his methods — whether he was formerly a cook in a restaurant, a candle-maker, 
or a tanner. His work is the only thing which challenges critical judgment, 
and that only when he has given it to the public." 



From tlie San Francisco Argonaut, 

" Mr H. H. Bancroft retired from active business for the express purpose 
of devoting himself to his histories ; he placed the management of that busi- 
ness in the hands of his brother, Mr A. L. Bancroft, who is still conducting it. 
As to the question of his employment of assistants, that is a matter of no- 
toriety. There has never been any secresy concerning it. Mr Bancroft has 
made repeated acknowledgment of their services, in the prefaces to his volumes 
and elsewhere. When a man devotes a large fortune, acquired during half a 
life-time, and devotes the remainder of that life-time as well, to the erection 
of a literary monument which will do honor to his native land, it is a sad com- 
mentary upon the envious and carping spirit of the day, that he should have 
such iinjust and cruel slurs made concerning his motives and his personal 
honor." 

[From the San Francisco Chronicle.'] 

"A short time ago the New York Evening Post published what it called a 
review of the first volume of H. H. Bancroft's History of the Pacific States 
In reality it was an attack on Mr Bancroft's conceptioia of the Aztec or Maya 
civilization, and very little space was given to the book under discussion. This 
was followed in a few days by a letter to the editor from an obscure lawyer in 
San Francisco, who made a failure of the Californian, and who charged that 



METHODS OF LITERARY WORK. 

Mr Bancroft's historical writing was done for liim by assistants, and that he 
was merely the editor of what purported to be his own work; that he spent 
his time in conducting the affairs of a large publishing house and not in writ- 
ing history, and that he offered to pay for favorable reviews of his book. The 
letter was so full of personal malice that it is difficult to ascertain how the 
editor of the Post came to admit it, especially as the man who made these 
charges is unknown and irresponsible. Of course those who know Mr Ban- 
croft do not need to have the falsehood in these charges exposed. The his- 
torian, however, could not keep silent imder such scandalous accusations, and 
he sent to the Post an answer which completely disposes of his slanderer. In 
it he gives some details of his work, which we reproduce, as they are of in- 
terest to anyone who has read his books." 

From the Sacramento Record-Union, 
"We can congratulate the author of this work that he has met with an unkind 
critic. It is well that the sneer should at times play its part. In the unani- 
mity with which Mr Bancroft's works have been received with open arms, 
there has been danger of praise palling upon taste. In an Eastern review he 
and his work have been mercilessly criticised and literally torn in twain. Re- 
duced to its essence, the objection that our Eastern contemporary takes to Mr 
Bancroft's volumes consists of two things — that he employes amanuenses who 
do the real labor of transcription and assist in the work of composition; and 
secondly, that he has not taken the conventional view of early history of the 
Western shores, ventured to differ with some eminent authors, and has treated ■ 
legend and romance as historical facts. Added to this is some carping that Mr 
Bancroft has not cited authors whom the reviewer deems the better writers on 
certain points of historic dispute. This is all there is in the criticism that 
has awakened so much public attention, and interested even the prosaic tele- 
, graph, when it is divested of the imquestionably scholarly guise. It is not 
to be conceded that the objections found to the style of Mr Bancroft are at all 
essential to be considered — we prefer, with the vast majority of readers, to 
look only at the accomplishments of the author. In the first place — though 
we have no commission to speak for Mr Bancroft, and no personal knowledge 
of what his own defense may be — it has never been a matter of concealment 
here that he was engaged in a work demanding the aid of a large number of 
ladies and gentlemen in the collation of the notes and data necessary to the 
work in hand. Certainly it was well known on this coast, and the designer 
of the work has been rather proud to make it known. (Hubert Howe Bancroft, Ya q \Tij^ 
retiring from a long life of labor as a merchant, inspired by a natural love for 
books, and by a taste for literature, qualified by a broad reading and a liberal 
education, began the collection of a private library, consisting, in the main, 
of works devoted to the history of the peoples of the Pacific shores of this 
continent. In this labor he visited Europe twice, searching in every nook and 
corner for treasures for his library, and for rare and desirable manuscripts and 
maps and charts. He spared no outlay of money in ransacking the world for 
the material so necessary to his task. His much travel, his untiring labor and 
patient research in this mattei', are facts of local history, and need not be re- 
peated. Suffice it to say no private library on the globe has been drawn from such 



r- 



METHODS OF LITERAEY WORK. 

varied sources or accumulated under such difficulties., It now stands in a hand- 
some building in San Francisco, which its owner erected as a fitting shrine for 
his work, a collection of 35,000 volumes. In detail, this library has been twice 
described in these columns. It was in the midst of these treasures that Mr 
Bancroft gave himself up to the arrangement and classifying of the facts of 
history relating to this coast, and the races of people who have dwelt here, the 
adventurers who have invaded it, the conquests it has been subject to, the 
scenes it has been the witness of, the growth and the development which have 
resulted from the contending forces of three centuries. When we listen to the 
theme Wagner's genius has prepared for our ear, and through it for our soul, 
we do not pause to ask how he accomplished it in detail. It is enough to 
know that he has grasped more of the divine inspiration of melody, has given 
it grander expression, than any of his predecessors; that he has gone beyond 
and before the age, and has drawn it up to him by the power of his genius. 
We do not invade the sanctuary of the composer and nib his pens, or test the 
quality of his inks; we do not care to know whether he was aided by aman- 
uenses or not. What we do care to know is, whose was the mind that con- 
ceived, whose the perseverance that accomplished ? It would add nothing to 
the appreciation of the work to know that the writer alone had penned every 
line, collated every fact, copied out every date, written every chapter and 
formulated every passage of a work, the very scope and character of which proves 
that to its accomplishment no single life would be sufficiently ample. On the 
contrary, the world is indebted to this man, because he had the broad com- 
prehension and the unselfish liberality and the genii;s to enter upon a task 
that can only be compassed by the very means he has employed. There were 
unwritten pages of history covering in their sweep such vast periods of time, 
that no single intelligence had before dai'ed to even contemplate them in their 
full extent, until Mr Bancroft essayed the task of gleaning from the world 
of scattered manuscript, books, maps, cha.rts, letters and wasting tomes, the 
fact and the romance, saving to the literature of our day these molding and 
fast being forgotten records. It is to him that the people of this century owe 
it that in a compact form and a reasonable number of volumes they are to be 
enabled to command at one view all of historical value that is existent in the 
world concerning this coast. To the very few was it given alone to even peer 
into the treasures of the history now undertaken by Bancroft, but by his 
agency, the humblest scholar will be enabled to walk in fields where he had 
never before hoped to tread. To the unselfish ambition of an humble citizen 
in gratifying the desire to add to the treasure-house of the world's knowledge, 
we are indebted for records that will endure as long as this country has a his- 
tory. We do not care to inquire into the hidden influence that inspires him 
to this work. We know it is not hope of gain, for from such a vast under- 
taking, involving such an outlay of money, there can be no adequate return 
in one lifetime, and M^e much doubt if ever the money-cost of producing this 
history of the Pacific States of America can be realized from the sales possible 
to such a work. There are certain events in the life of every man that stamp 
and fashion his character, but it is of no present consequence to this people 
what the event was that moved our fellow-citizen to enter upon the work 
which now absorbs the hours and years of his life and the fortune that com- 



METHODS OF LITERARY WORK. 

mercial pursuits had gathered. It is enough to know that he is contributing 
to the intelligence of the world, and is doing a work that will not be lost 
when he is gone, but will, by coming generations, be prized more richly than 
is possible by us. What, then, if the carping critic shall discover flaws in the 
style of the writer; shall we allow these to blind us to his marvelous resolu- 
tion and indomitable perseverance, even if we shall admit for the time and 
the argument that the critic is correct in his view ? \^^What if it be true that 
Bancroft is at times " strained and pragmatical, or that his philosophizings are 
sometimes in narrow grooves and superficial " — shall we permit these defects 
of minor importance to blind us to the inestimable value of this ample store- 
house of knowledge which he has piled to the very rafters for the delectation 
of his fellow-men ? That in his methods and his style he gives evidence of 
rare originality and marked vigor of thought; that he is no mere copyist; that 
he is just in his estimates, cool in his judgment, dispassionate in his arraign- 
ments and faithful in his recitals, none have denied. As to the criticism that 
he has elevated myths into historical realities, and has sought to build into 
facts romances aud legends, let the impartial reader determine. Certainly 
neither the critic nor Mr Bancroft can discuss those matters with satisfaction 
in the ordinary limits of newspaper columns. But we pass these profitless 
considerations growing out of the methods Mr Bancroft employed to index, 
arrange and annotate his vast collection and divide it into historical, ethnogra- 
phical, biographical and physical divisions, and to draw therefrom the facts 
and data necessary to his task. We turn to consider rather the work itself — 
the result of the fine tastes of a gentleman of culture — the contribution of a 
Californian to the literature of his country, the gift of an unselfish man to 

the historical records of a nation as yet upon the threshold of life and action. 

******* 

The series contemplated by Mr Bancroft could never have been prepared had 
he not adopted the system he did of engaging in the work a number of assist- 
ants, who carry out the conception that is his alone, and every line of whose 
work passes under the master's eye and is prepared according to the model 
and outline he has given, while all the more important conunentaries come 
from his pen direct, as we understand it." 



WHAT IS BEING SAID OF MR HUBERT H. BANCROFT 
AND HIS LITERARY WORK. 



STYLE. 

"His style is clear and without affectation, recalling the straightforward 
simplicity of Herodotus." — London Westminster Review. 

"He writes well and gracefully." — New York Sun. 

" I am full of admiration at the immense reading it displays, and at the 
singular, vivid, and graceful English in which that reading is expressed." 
W. H. Lecky. 

"The work is intensely interesting. Mr Bancroft's style is clear, his 
arrangement of materials judicious, and his symmetry admirable." — Chicago 
Journal. 

" Striking passages are welded together with a logical cohesion so strict 
that it is almost impossible to detach them." — New York Herald. 

"It is written in a clear, concise way, the language being always well 
chosen, and quite frequently very beautiful, without any straining for effect." 
Pittsburg Gazette. 

"High standard of style and scholarship." — Boston Elan's Herald. 

"It is of great value, which is enhanced by its charm of style." — Chicago 
Times. 

" 1 am particularly pleased with the sharp, condensed form in which the 
facts are given." — Oliver Wendell Holmes. 

"Mr Bancroft's style deserves great commendation. He has evidently 
sought to be concise — those who do so often become obscure. He has not 
fallen into this fault. It has been said that the first qualification of a good 
writer is to have a clear notion of what he wishes to express. Mr Bancroft 
always has this; he must have great analytical power, and yet his descrip- 
tions manifest an unusual skill in synthetical reconstruction. His style is 
concise, lucid, graphic, often epigrammatic." — San Francisco Bulletin. 

" The information has been digested into a flowing and entertaining narra- 
tive." — New York Observer. 

" Clear, concise, forcible, and well adapted to the requirements of modem 
students. " — Overland Monthly. 

ABILITT. 

"He has applied the scientific methods of history writing in a manner 
never before dreamed of." — Record-Union. 

"Beyond all the patient labor in marshalling details, Mr Bancroft shows 
also a sound, healthy literary judgment." — Atlantic Monthly. 



2 WHAT IS BEING SAID. 

" He has investigated with the most conscientious care and criticised with 
no little sivill the enormous mass of official documents which in different ways 
relate to his subject; and he has digested the results of his laborious toil into 
a narrative clear, logical, and attractive." — London Times. 

" You have handled a complex, sometimes even tangled and tautological 
subject, with much clearness and discrimination. The conscientious labor in 
collecting, and the skill shown in the convenient arrangement of such a vast 
body of material, deserve the highest praise." — J. JR. Lowell. 

"The plan of the great work has been honored in the execution." — Daily 
Orego7ilan. 

" It is a monument of well-directed industry and great ability. " — Edinburgh 
Scotsman. 

"A lasting monument to the scholarship and ability of its author." — Louis- 
ville Courier-Jou7-nal. 

"The industry, the sound judgment, and the excellent literary style dis- 
played in this work cannot be too highly praised. It stands quite alone of 
its class in this department." — Boston Post. 

"Mr Prescott was carried away by his vivid imagination, and errs in ex- 
cess. Mr Morgan errs in the opposite direction. Mr Bancroft avoids both 
extremes. Without such preliminary work as that which has been done by 
Mr Bancroft, a history would be impossible." — Edinburgh Review. 

" The manner in which you have sifted and weighed the testimony, derived 
as it is from various and sometimes contradictory sources; the penetration 
and inapartiality you have displayed in discarding whatever is erroneous or 
doubtful, and accepting that only which is well authenticated, would be cred- 
itable in a judicial investigation." — /. Ross Broione. 

" Never was a large library more thoroughly ransacked or more completely 
laid under tribute by a writer." — The, Nation. 

"Where Mr Bancroft expresses opinions of his own, or discourses on the 
bearing and significance of the observations of others, he performs the part 
of the enlightened critic with much shrewdness and modesty." — London Tele- 
graph. 

"Every reader must admire the single-heartedness with which he devotes 
himself to the investigation of facts. His volumes are really a marvel of 
research and discrimination. Although he does not conceal his consciousness 
of a mission, he shows no trace of the credulity with which specialists are 
apt to pursue the inquiries to which they have devoted theu' lives. His sound 
judgment is no less apparent on the pages of his work than his indefatigable 
diligence and supreme self-devotedness. No one but an enthusiast could 
grapple with such a task, but his enthusiasm is without weakness, and is in- 
spired by the pure love of knowledge, not by the caprices of sentiment. 
Hence it is of the quality demanded for the successful accomplishment of one 
of the foremost literary enterprises of the day," — New York 7\ibune. 

"What good sense, painstaking labor, and honesty of purpose can hope to 
achieve, Mr Bancroft has accomplished." — London Standard. 

"Nothing seems to have been too minute to escape his eyes." — Boston 
Transcript. 

" The history of literature does not contain many examples of a grander 
literary purpose, a more thorough preparation, or a more successful achieve- 
ment." — Boston VonQ7'egationalist. 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. 3 

THE WOEK. 

"Not only •anequalled, but iinapproached. A literary entei-prise more de- 
ser\dng of a generous sympathy and support has never been undertaken on 
this side of the Atlantic." — North American Review. 

" One of the most notable in our literature." — Literary World. 

"I am finding your collection of facts very valuable for my own more im- 
mediate ends in writiug the Principles of Sociology." — Herbert Spencer. 

"A work of enormous research, and i-equu-ing careful study." — Sir II. C. 
Rawlinson. 

"The wonder and admiration of all literary men; and will be a lasting 
monument of the indomitable energy and perseverance of a man who is de- 
voting the best part of his life to enrich the literature of the world l^y giving 
to it a correct history of this hitherto almost unknown and incomprehensible 
part of the globe." — /. M. Hamilton. 

"Magnificent work." — Charles Darwin. 

"A solid one." — Max Miiller. 

"Exceedingly interesting and important." — Thomas Carlyle. 

"One of the noblest literary enterprises of our day." — John G. Whittler. 

"He has discovered a thousand rivulets of doubtful source and uncertain 
direction, and united them into a broad historic stream. We know of no 
volume of history more instructive to the student, or more interesting to the 
general reader. It will remain forever a monument to the industry and abil- 
ity of the author." — J^erritorial Enterprise. 

" A monument of literary and historical industry." — A. R. Spofford. 

" It is simply fascinating." — Clarence King. 

" An interesting work, conveying great profit and instruction." — Sir John 
Luhhoclc. 

"It is a production of almost incredible labor, of excellent arrangement, 
and admirable execi;tion, everywhere betraying the union of quiet enthu- 
siasm and sound judgment which have been exercised in its preparation." 
George Ripley. 

"Of surpassing interest, and of a value great and constantly increasing." 
Hartford Courant. 

"Interests readers of every class." — Christian Union. 

"A very valuable addition to the history of the American continent." 
Boston Advertiser. 

"A monument that will cause his name to be remembered ages after he has 
ceased to be in the flesh." — The Guardian. 

" It is safe to say that there has not occurred in the literary history of the 
United States a more piquant surprise." — Scribner's Alonthlij. 

" The work forms one of the most valuable contributions of modem times, 
and should have an honored place in every well-selected library." — Journal 

of Science. 

" His completed work will be reckoned among the most precious treasures 
of oui- literature." — Literary World. 



4 WHAT, IS BEING SAID. 

"A gi'eat storehouse of facts which bear upon the most important specula- 
tions."— »S'a«. Francisco Post. 

" One of the most formidable and important literary undertakings of mod- 
em times. " — Stockton Independent. 

" It will be a standard work on this interesting subject for all coming time, 
and will immortalize the author." — San Jose Mercury. 

" Your work has taught me a great many things. It needs no praise from 
me. It will be consulted and read centuries after you are gone." — Jno. W. 
Draper. 

"The work is one of immense magnitude and importance; yet the promise 
is of its being well done." — JSIorwkh Bulletin. 

•'The work will be one of the most important in the language." — American 
Booksellei'ii' Guide. 

"One of the most complete and exhaustive works ever published." — Ne- 
vada Transcript. 

" It is worthy of special attention by the historical student and the general 
reader." — Boston Globe. 

"A more interesting book has seldom been pi:t in our hands, containing a 
mine of information of which we confess we were utterly ignorant." — Land 
and Water, London. 

"Embodies much more than any other single literary production. " — Deseret 
News. 

"A fascinating tale." — Vallejo Chronicle. 

"The book contains a wealth of information, and its interest is quite that 
of an entrancing romance, notwithstanding the severely accurate manner in 
which the author deals with his subject." — Milwaukee Sentinel. 

"The plan sketched is a magnificent one, and a substantial contribution 
will be made to the realized knowledge of the world." — Family Treasury, 
London. 

"The history of this book as well as its contents is of public interest." 
The Academy, London. 

"It is the only history of the kind in existence, and its value can hardly 
be overestimated." — Gold Hill News. 

' ' The value of this work is certainly beyond calculation. " — Stanislaus News. 

" Dans cette grande ceuvre, il a prodigu^ les bank notes comme un spdcula- 
teur, pour travailler ensuite avec la longue patience d'un 6rudit." — Paris 
Revue. 

" Exceptionally great historic work." — Springfield Republican. 

" The most unique and extensive literary enterprise ever undertaken in any 
country by a single private individual." — Buffalo Advertiser. 

" J'en connaissais le plan, gr^ce k un article du Times, que I'lm de nos cor- 
respondants de Londres avait eu I'attention d'addresser a I'academie de Sta- 
nislas, dont je fais partie. L'execution repond completement h ce qui a eta 
annonce par la presse." — Lucien Adam, 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. 5 

"It shows great merit, and is an excellent contribution to the permanent 
literature of the country." — A. A. Sargent. 

"Beyond all ordinary forms of praise." — San Francisco Chronicle. 

"It is certainly a worthy scheme, and is being carried out most conscien- 
tiously." — London Spectator. 

' ' It shows joxi are working for true success and not f of momentary ap- 
plause." — Daniel 0. Gihnan. 

" It is a labor the value of which will be more clearly seen as time goes by." 
Baltimore Gazette. 

' ' Of extraordinary research, and of the deepest interest to every intelligent 
citizen." — Bakersfield Courier. 

' ' The chapter which Prescott devotes, in his Conquest of Mexico, to the 
manners and customs of the Aztecs, is the most attractive in his attractive 
book, and that has hitherto been the best source of information upon the 
matter, within reach of the general English reader; but it is now thro^vn into 
the shade, at least so far as comprehensiveness of treatment is concerned, by 
Mr Bancroft's labors." — Alta California. 

"Ademas del m^rito incontestable de la obra, hay otro muy grande en las 
notas, y el libro ofrece nueva utilidad como tabla general de las cosas de 
America. No ha querido "V. presentar solamente el resultado de sus immensas 
investigaciones, sino que tambien ha querido dar a otros los medios de tratar 
los mismos materias, bajo diferente punto de vista." — Joaquin Garcia Icaz- 
balceta. 

"A clearer and more truthful picture has never yet been produced." — Lon- 

^ don News. 

"La biblioth^que, qui est son CBuvre, I'a beaucoup aid(^ pour ce travail, 
mais il s'est en outre entour(5 de documents precieux puises dans les archives 
qui des r^publiques qui se sont fait un honneur de les mettre h sa disposi- 
tion." — U Italic, Rome. 

"Audi im entferntesten Westen giebt es Manner, die sich fiir Kunst und 
Wissenschaft interessiren, und zwar nicht, wie mancher vielleicht annehmen 
mochte, um pekuniaren Nutzen daraus zu ziehen, sondern allein aus Liebe 
zur guten Sache. Ein trefFendes Beispiei hierzu gewiihrt die grosse und reiche 
Privatbibliothek des Hrn. Hubert H. Bancroft in San Francisco. " — Bibliotheh- 
wissenschaft, Dresden. 

" II Presidente Quadra mentre commenda altamente il colossale lavoro isto- 
rico condotto con tanta intelligente sagacia dall' onor. Hubert H. Bancroft 
(clie come gi^ annunciammo in altro numero, si propone di compilare la isto- 
ria della California e delle Repubbliche ispano-americane) dice che a causa 
delle convulsioni politiche che fin dalla loro esistenza di mezzo secolo tennero 
sempre sossopra quel paesi, fecero trascurare quest' opera. Ed invero quelle 
repubbliche hanno pur gloriose pagine !" — UEco d'ltalia. 

"A tantas palabras de encomio y estimulo por parte de hombres notables 
por su saber, hay que agregar la presteza y benevolencia con que los Presi- 
dentes del Salvador y Nicaragua, y los gobemadores de los Estados mejicanos 
de Jalisco y Sonora se han ofrecido k suministrar al seiior Bancroft cuantos 
dates, manuscritos e impresos scan necesarios para que pueda Uevar d bu^ 
termino la historia de los paises comprendidos entre el istmo de Panamd. y el 
estrecho de Behring. " — Voz del Nuevo Mundo. 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. 



PERSONAL. 



" No tribute can be too great to the industry and research of the author." 
British Quarterly Review. 

" Mr Bancroft's manner is calculated to give us confidence." — London 
Saturday Review. 

'^ Mr Bancroft's motto is 'Thorough.' His mind is of the German cast." 
Charles Nordltoff. 

"Mr Bancroft is the historian for "whrm we have all been looking, and we 
may count ourselves fortunate in finding him so worthy of his task." — The 
Galaxy. 

"To Mr Bancroft we tender cordial congratulations, with assurances of 
our sincere appreciation of the ability, candor, and research which charac- 
terize every step in the progress of his great work." — New York Independent. 

"He has entered on one of the boldest literary enterprises ever under- 
taken." — Francis Parkman. 

"He has done more than any public society would have done for fifty 
years to come, and what perhaps no society could do at any later period. " — 
P. B. Avery. 

"His success has been remarkable, and his work will be of the greatest 
service." — Nature, London. 

"He is evidently a most painstakrag and conscientious worker." — Popular 
Science Monthly. 

" We qiiestion whether it has ever fallen to the lot of one man to conduct 
so successfully, so colossal a literary enterprise." — Boston Journal. 

"Won the praise of Herbert Spencer and Sir Arthur Helps, in England, 
and that of all interested in the subject in that country, and of very many in 
Germany and France. The praise was well deserved. " — Philadelphia Gazette. 

"I am glad to see your work welcomed in Europe as well as in your own 
country. In the universality of your researches you occupy a field of the 
deepest interest to the world, and without a rival." — George Bancroft, 

" Several of the Presidents of the Central American and Mexican States 
have appointed commissioners to collect and forward to Mr Bancroft mate- 
rials for his history." — New York Post. 

"The projector of such an enterprise can have no sordid motive; a very 
limited endowment of sagacity may perceive the futility of pecuniary return 
awaiting work of this character." — The Examine?: 

" What a godsend such a devotee would have been for the Atlantic coast 
a hundred years ago !" — Wendell Phillips. 

" I am amazed at the extent and minuteness of your researches." — William 
Cullen Bryant. 

\ 

" What strikes me most in it is the exceeding fairness with which he treats 
the researches and the theories of other inquirers into subjects akin to his 
own." — Sir Arthur Helps. 

"Whittier, Longfellow, Lowell, Holmes, Emerson, Higginson, Gray, 
Phillips, Warner, Adams, Porter, Nordhoff, of the Atlantic literati, as well 
as all Californians of erudition, have congratulated Mr Bancroft on his great 
undertaking and successful accomplishment." — Marysvill^ Appeal. 



WHAT IS BEIXG SAID. 7 

"Children yet unborn in the Golden State of the Pacific will rise xvp and 
call him blessed who has left them such a rich inheritance." — Santa Cruz 
Sentinel. 

"You have done yourself and your State great honor." — Samuel L. M. 
Barlow. 

" I am amazed at your courage and perseverance in working your way 
through siTch a chaparral of authorities as you quote. Your labor is im- 
mense." — Henry W. Lonrjfellow. 

"Your practised eye, by looking at a single one of his notes in the first 
volume of his great book, will recognize an extraordinary thoroughness and 
wealth of preparation, and his patience and modesty in doing this work in 
comparatrv'e obscurity and without sympathy, furnish an example for us 
all." — 2\ W. Higrjinson to James Parton. 

"Men have before devoted life and fortune to the prosecution of great 
historical works, and have labored with a diligence and a thoroughness which 
can scarcely be surpassed ; but it has been reserved for Mr Bancroft to unite 
complete mastery of his subjects with rapidity of workmanship quite unpar- 
alleled, and possible only through a scientific process of study and classifica- 
tion." — Sacram£.nto Record. 

" 'God bless such workers !' says Charles D. Warner, and w-e heartily say 
the same. " — Literary Review. 

"The Macaulay of the V7e?!.t."— Wendell Phillips. 



SOME LATER NOTICES. 

"One is carried along from the very first page by an impetuosity which is 
at once charming and irresistible. The interest is immediately awakened, 
the attention promptly fixed. There is something in the dash and flow which 
in itself attracts and excites. * * * r^^^^ present volume is a marvel 
of industry and hard work. The material collected, the authorities consulted, ' 
the skid with which all have been collected and arranged, and the attractive- 
ness of style in which the whole has been presented to the public, merit the 
highest praise. The narrative abounds in incidents of exciting interest and 
facts of great importance — social, historical, and political ; rendering this latest 
literary achievment of J^.Ir Bancroft as work attractive alike to the general 
reader, the historian, the statesman, and the sociologist. Of Mr Bancroft's 
Native Races, men of prominence, like Mr Herbert Sjjencer and Mr Lecky, 
wrote in the most eulogistic terms ; and no juster criticism can be pronounced 
on the distinguished American historian's recent publication, than to say that 
it is in every respect worthy of its predecessor in the instructive and im- 
portant series of contributions to American history, on which our author is 
engaged. "—London Morning Post. 

' ' We hardly know which to admire most — the marvelous patience and per- 
severance of the author, or the scholarly learning and just and discriminating 
judgment which is displayed. The style is one that should be followed by 
historians. It is clear and forcible, and the manner in whicli he has chronicled 
the events is masterly." — Liverpool Albion and Telephone. 

" Of the work in hand, the first volume is now before us ; and, accepting it 
as a fair sample of the whole, we are bound to offer our tribute to the author, 
for the enormous industry indicated and for the style in which the v.'ork is 
being carried through." — Glasgow Herald. 



8 WHAT IS BEING SAID. 

"His style is at once vigorous and suave ; descending now with Hume into 
the profundities of philosophic thought ; now soaring with Riiskin into the 
realms of poetic fancy, or breaking forth frequently with the unmistakable 
brilliancy of genius. He shows ability in depicting tlie beauties of nature, 
and in portraying character and motive. Nor does he fail in the subtleties of 
sarcasm ; and in the use of classic allusions he shows a prudence admirably 
distinct from the affectation of mere sippers at the Pierian fountains. Though 
precise lilie Gibbon, he avoids his formality; though massive, he rounds his 
acute stateliness. America may well be proud of her western historian, who 
must take his place with the foremost of the age. " — Sacramento Record- Union. 

"His research, no less than his vivid and graceful style, has extorted the 
admiration of Mr. Lecky and Mr. Herbert Spencer ; and the present volume 
bears abundant traces both of his laborious collection of materials and of his 
power of using them in the construction of a narrative of fascinating interest." 
— London Daily News. 

"The vivid narrative flows on with astonishing ease and power. There is 
not a dull page in the book." — The Continent. 

"Your method of study is absolutely the only way of accomplishing the 
vast undertaking which you have entered upon — one of the most remarkable 
in literary history. The example of wealth successfully devoted to a high 
intellectual object, will be a benefit to the whole country ; and the throwing 
of so much enterprise and energy into such a channel will go far to remove 
one of the stigmas of our American civilization." — Francis Parhman. 

" Mr Bancroft is a remarkable man. His volumes are rich and attractive, 
and crammed full of good learning. It cannot be read in haste, particularly 
if one wishes to get at the substance of the notes as he goes along, which have 
so much real historical meat in them. The Columbus portion, I have enjoyed 
thoroughly. It seems to me the author's aim is truth, and not eulogy. Hav- 
ing previously studied somewhat the subject of the early maps, I was par- 
ticularly interested in his long note on that important theme. His criticisms 
on those writers who had previously gone over his ground, or a portion of it, 
seem fair and generous. The introduction to this book is a marvellous piece 
of generalization." — Charles Dean, L.L.D. 

" The advance volume you sent me has been eagerly examined, and proves 
more than I dared to hope — full of interesting facts, well marshalled ; the nar- 
rative well sustained, and the basis of profound, exhaustive knowledge of the 
whole ground apparent everywhere. " — Weiidell Phillips. 

" Mr Bancroft knows how highly I appreciate the importance of the great 
work upon which he is engaged, and also the fearless and impartial spirit in 
which it is undertaken. I am certain that the early history of the continent 
will gain in interest by the revision of judgment of many historical characters 
and events." — Charles D. Warner. 

"The plan and execution thus far is worthy of the author of the Native 
Races, a work monumental of his industry and ability, and of which every 
American should be proud. I shall look for the succeeding volumes with eager 
interest." — John G. Whittier. 

"It is amazing to see what a man dares undertake, still more to see what 
he has accomplished. After your first magnum opus there is nothing we do 
not think you capable of ; and, if you should announce the prospective publi- 
cation of ' A Diary of the World from A. M. One to the present day, in one 
hundred cords of octavo vokmies,' we should believe you would do it accord- 
ing to the prospectus. I found wonderful pleasure in your previous work, 
and I doubt not that the coming one will equal the expectations which the 
first has raised." — Oliver Wendell Holmes. 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. 9 

" Probably there is nothing in the world which exactly corresponds in 
value, in interest, in abundance, and in completeness, with this priceless 
library'. Both hemispheres have been searched for treasures to fill it, and with 
such results that there is no country on the globe, for whose early history such 
ample material has now been brought together as for that of California. The 
Native Raws gave Mr Bancroft at once a distinguished position as an investi- 
gator, and it is not too much to say that his additions to our previous knowl- 
edge of the civilization which the Spaniards found on the Pacific Coast were 
so important and so interesting that they seemed like disclosures. He is now- 
recognized as an authority of the first rank. Mr Bancroft has had access to 
a multitude of documents, which were unknown to the earlier historian, and 
has followed a method much more searching and precise than suited Irving's 
temperament. As a consequence, we have a narrative which is practically 
new, abounding in picturesque detail, and presenting the tragical romance of 
discovery and conquest with a particularity and vividness it has never pos- 
sessed in any previous record. The storj' is well constructed, and in spite of 
the iDrofusion of incidents, it is clear, it is interesting, and it is animated. Of 
the writer's sincere regai-d for the truth there cannot be a doubt. To the his- 
tory proper he prehxes a brilliant introductory chapter upon Spanish charac- 
ter and civilization at the period of the conquest; and this is followed by the 
story of Columbus, and an exhaustive and admirable summary of geographi- 
cal knowledge and discovery from the earliest record to the year 1540. We 
might copy specimen pages almost at random Avithout danger of doing Mr 
Bancroft injustice, for he is never dull." — New York Tribune. 

"As Bacon took the co-ordination of all knowledge for his province, so 
Mr Hubert H. Bancroft has taken the co-ordination of all western North 
American history for the task-book of his literary ambition. Designing to 
present a series of full and accurate histories of the Pacitic States of North 
America from their discovery and settlement by EuT-opeans down to the 
present time, he preluded that great undertaking by the publication of his 
magnificent volumes on the J^ative Races of those States — a work which, 
on its first appearance, a few years ago, commanded for its author the highest 
applause in mouths of wisest censure, and which will ever remain as a 
monument to the writer's intelligence and industry. But what shall be said 
in adequate praise of this intelligence and this industry when we add that it is 
the purpose of Mr Bancroft to continue the work thus begun, in a series of 
thirty-four sviccessive volumes, relating to the history and literature of this 
great continental section ? As a fitting preface to the Avhole series, Mr 
Bancroft commences the present volume with a vivid and pictoral review of 
European society, and especially of the Spanish civilization and polity at the 
close of the fifteenth century. It is a fine analysis by which Mr Bancroft 
traces in tliis composite character the reckless courage and insouciance of the 
volatile Celt, the adventurous spirit of the Phoenician, the mining skill of 
the Iberian, etc. 

" We need not say that the contents of this volume relate to the two most 
splendid achievements of the human race, for as such we certainly must ac- 
count the discovery of America by Columbus, and the discovery of the 
Pacific Ocean by Balboa. It has been reserved for Mr Bancroft to place the 
character and exploits by the latter for the first time in their proper histoi'ical 
framework, for we presume that most readers are not aware that the tidings of 
Balboa's discovery created little less sensation in Europe than that of Columbus, 
twenty-two years before." — New Yoi'k Herald. 

" The character of Columbus is treated in the light of facts, with©ut anv 
aid from the imagination, and differs widely from that which Irving'^s 
exuberant fancj^ has made a tradition. As depicted by Mr Bancroft. 
Columbus is less the demi-god, but more the man. The narative, while never 
sacrificing photographic exactness to vivid coloring, or cold fact to brilliancy, 
is of absorbing interest, and reads like one long romance." — Syracuse Herald. 



10 WHAT IS BEING SAID. 

" He is the Herbert Spencer of historians. His diligence in collecting 
data his painstaking in arrangement, his accuracy of statement, as well as 
the vastness of his undertakings, contribute to give him a place among histo- 
rians similar to that occupied by Mr. Spencer among sociologists. His style 
is energetic, strong and picturesque. His judgments are just ; his conclu- 
sions follow from the facts, and his narrative is almost invariably of unflag- 
ging interest. Not only do the American peojole and the historical student 
owe to tlie author a large debt of gratitude for this work, which one not pos- 
sessed of enthusiasm and historical genius, as well as patience, would never 
have undertaken ; but many governments of Europe, whose explorers set foot 
on the Pacific Coast, should feel the obligations under which they are 
placed." — Boston Journal. 

" Open the book at random, and interesting matter greets your eye. The 
style is good, and the pages fairly glisten with incidents. Not a dull 
pao-e between those covers— young aad old will dehght m it. The contents 
are fresh and new ; not even Prescott can claim more homage from the 
reader than should be given Mr. Bancroft for his noble beginning of a noble 
endeavor to be truthful and captivating at the same time."— Pittsbiiry Tele- 
graph. 

"I take pleasure in calling your attention to Mr. Hubert H. Bancroft's 
Ilistori/ of the Pacific States. The volumes already issued, as indeed the greater 
part of the work, treat of times and events of great interest to the Catholic 
world. I am assured that five out of the seven volumes on California will be 
devoted to the history of the country under Missionary regime, nine-tenths 
of which has never appeared in print, being drawn from Government and 
Archiepiscopal Archives, and from private and wholly original sources. The 
Histories of Central America and Mexico are altogether of Catholic countries, 
societies and institutions. It has been carefully noted in the volumes already 
in print that the distinguished author has treated all subjects bearing on 
Church History or Eeligion, with both great ability and candor, which guaran- 
tees the assurance that as a Ilistori/ of the Pacific States it will compare favor- 
ably with the best literary productions of the kind. I intend to enrich my 
diocesan library with this interesting work, as I should deem it incomplete 
without it." 

<i> J. S. ALEMANY, A. S. F. 

"His style is clear and forcible; it is attractive for its incisiveness, its 
plainness, its smooth, rapid, energetic, logical progression. He might be 
classed with Herodotus for logic and perspicuity, with Gibbon for studious 
thoroughness, with Macaulay for brilliant attractiveness, with Napier for 
truth, analysis and critical judgment." — Pochester Morning Herald. 

" His methods of writing history are nothing less than royal. Judged purely 
and simply as a literary performance, there is the highest praise to be awarded 
to this history of Central America. Too much praise cannot be given for his 
candor, his spirit of equity and love of truth. The book grows more and moro 
interesting until the final page. The work as a whole is superb and calls for 
genuine enthusiasm. We are proud that such an undertaking has arisen in 
this land — an undertaking which will surely add no less glory to our literary 
history than Prescott's or Irving's immortal work." — Philadelphia Pr-ess. 

"Of the thoroughness of his research, the indefatigableness of his spirit, the 
enthusiasm of his temper, the honesty of his mind, the independence and 
candor of his judgment, there can be no question." — Literary World. 

"This work is so thoroughly that of a man possessed of his subject, anxious 
to read it in all its lights, to search out its sources, and trace its bearings that 
it will not fail to captivate the general reader, as well as arrest tlie attention 
of the scholar, who will be interested in the presence some of the heroes of 
history make in the unqualified light turned upon them." — Albany Times. 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. H 

" He does not stand much in awe of traditional reputations, and seems 
determined to state frankly the facts as he finds them, and never hesitates to 
express his own conclusions. The author's brilliant and picturesque narration 
will attract readers, and his outspoken positions will attract the critics. He 
takes a decidedly different view of Columbus from those given by Irving and 
Prescott, and he does not, like those authors, forget that the good Isabella 
was a bigot of the most unrelenting sort, and largely responsible for the In- 
quisition ; nor does he praise her at the expense of her husband. The later 
misfortunes of Columbus he attributes not so much to jealousy and loss of 
royal favor, through the intrigue of enemies, as to his own incompetence for 
affairs, his vanity and impracticability." — Hartford Courant. 

" Hubert H. Bancroft is getting to be noted alike as a careful, industrious 
historian, and a collector of very valuable books and manuscripts. The com- 
prehensive scope and detail of his Avork are both unusual. His new book is a 
marvel of painstaking research and accuracy. " — Philadelphia Times. 

' ' Mr Bancroft has pursued a most scholarly method in the arrangement 
of his work. He is conscientious and sagacious ia his balancing of authori- 
ties, and his frequent classical allusions show a deep study of ancient and 
modern autlors." — S. F. Pod. 

" The work is so thoroughly that of a man possessed of his subject, anxious 
to read it in all its lights, to search out its sources, and trace its bearings, 
that it will not fail to captivate the general reader, as well as arrest the at- 
tention of the scholar, who will be interested in the presence some of the 
heroes of history make in the unqualified light now turned upon them. The 
volume before us leads to the return of Cortes; and those who follow the 
picturesque and rapid sweep of its story will await with eagerness the next 
number, which relates to the gorgeous history of the Conquest of Mexico. " — 
S. F. Arcjonaut. 

" A shining current of history streams through the pages. For hundreds 
of pages this book burns with the infernal record of religious crime. The 
historian writes through it with his pen afire; the reader shudders through it, 
his heart sick and his eyes ablaze. While this book lives, the memor}'' of the 
hapless Indian and his unequaled wrongs can never die out of the conscious- 
ness of mankind. The style is, upon the whole, admirable. It is vivid and 
truthful as expressive of the idea. Much of it touches a high eloquence. 
Pictures stand out sometimes, each from a single felicitous word. The his- 
torian frequently suggests the picturesque groupings of Carlyle without any 
of his outlandish dressing of words. You see the thing which is sought to be 
presented, and the eye is not too much caught by the pigments. Sometimes 
the long oar-sweep of words is exchanged by a fine sententiousness. Thus, 
' Discipline begotten by necessity, engenders strength, which, fattened by 
luxury, swells to weakness ;' and the analysis of the Castilian from which we 
have just quoted, is, throughout, as cool and clear a chapter of scholarly ex- 
position as it has been our good fortune to see for many a day." — S. F. 
Bulletin. 

" Seven or eight years ago Mr Hubert H. Bancroft, of San Francisco, sur- 
prised the reading world with his Native Races of the Pacific States, wherein 
he gave astonishing glimpses into an anticj^uity rivaling that of Egypt, and 
disclosed the little-thought-of fact, that what is called the New World is 
quite as likely as not, the old one, ethnologically as well as geologically. That 
work was regarded as a marvel of research, and justly so, in coiiparison with 
most works in the historic field, and had the further credit of investing 
a naturally dry theme, with a singularly living interest. This was at once 
accepted as a standard work, and its author thought to have fixed himself 
among the first historic writers of the day. But the work of collecting ma- 
.teijial relating to the Pacific States of North America went on after the 



12 ^HAT IS BEING SAID, 

completion of that work, until the author has now collected a library of more 
than thirty-five thousand volumes, all relating to that region, and he has pro- 
jected and begun a historical work -of colossal proportions. So far as is 
known, business methods, as they may be called, have never been applied on 
so complete a scale, to the preparation of such a work. The result is marvel- 
lous — marvellous in respect to the amount of labor which one man is thus 
enabled to accomplish within a given time. The value of the history, consid- 
ered as a whole, depends upon the master-mind which directs the whole — upon 
its capacity to group facts and generalize from them. This breadth, vigor, 
and clearness of mental grasp, Mr Bancroft has in an eminent degree. For 
the first time, the story of the beginnings of Spanish occupation of America 
is put into a connected and lucidly arranged form in the English tongue. A 
large portion of the cited authoi'ities has never hitherto been known to the 
world. Mr Bancroft has unearthed old State and ecclesiastical manusci-ipts, 
of whose existence all traces had been lost, and has thrown a flood of light 
upon subjects which have seemed forever obscured. This is notaljly so in two 
or three points. For example, it has always seemed a most extraordinary 
thing that Columbus should meet with the failures which attended his coloni- 
zation enterprises, and the repeated neglects and abuses of those in power, if 
he was indeed the ready-to-be-canonized saint that Irving, for instance, paints 
him. Mr Bancroft makes the matter clear. With judicial fairness he shows 
the weak as well as the strong points of the man's character, and one sees 
clearly how the very characteristics that lead to his success as a navigator and 
discoverer, totally unfitted him to be either soldier or politician ; and, com- 
bined with unquestionably unjust treatment, made the latter part of his life 
full of almost, or quite, insane delusions. Among the most interesting feat- 
tures of the work are the copious bibliographical foot-notes, many of them 
containing criticisms, nearly always bold, original, acute, of Irving, Prescott, 
and other authors; but criticism which, however fearless and incisive, is 
always frank and good-tempered. It would be a pleasure to follow the begin- 
ning of this colossal undertaking further in detail, but it is impracticable 
here. The day will come when the beginnings of the history of the vast em- 
pire, yet in its babyhood, on our Pacific slope, will be studied moi'e curiously 
than that of any other part of the world, and no other work can ever hope to 
rival that of Mr Bancroft as the standard authority. It presents evidence of 
wide and patient research ; it is generalized with remarkable breadth of view ; 
it is clear in statement, lucid in arrangement, and last, but by no means least, 
it is pervaded with a flavor of living, breathing interest in its author, which 
makes it interesting to the reader. In fine, the completed work, finished on 
the scale of this opening volume, will be worthy to take rank with the very 
best of modern historical works, with points of superiority to nearly all of 
them." — Chicago Times. 

"So vast is the field opened up by such a plan that one would doubt the 
ability of a single man to do more than skirt its borders ; but Mr Bancroft has 
proved in his previous work that he has reduced the writing of history to an 
exact science. Endowed with large means, with unusual executive abilities 
which enable him to direct and make use of the labor of a large corps of intel- 
ligent assistants, he is really in a position enjoyed by few literary workers. 
He is enabled to do more in one year than the ordinary historian can do in a 
decade. Mr Bancroft has an eminently practical way of looking at history. 
There is no effort made to bolster up a man or a creed, as we find in Macaulay 
and Froude; there is absolutely none of that ingenious work which has been 
aptly called 'historical whitewashing.' The historian seems to be free from 
all prejudice, free from partisan bias and rancor. Greater scope will be given 
in subsequent volumes to this admirable method of impartial criticisni; but 
instances of it are not lacking here, and they are an earnest of the spirit in 
which this work will be written. 

" Especially worthy of careful reading are the notes on Coliimbus, and on 
the credibility of the early chroniclers. In the former he makes a keen 



WHAT IS BEING SAID. 13 

' analysis of tlie defects of Irving and Prescott, showing that each was a special 
pleader, sacrificing the truth of history to the hero he was placing on a 
pedestal. The author pays a generous tribute to their work, but he shows 
that it is not history in the best sense of the word." — S. F. Chronicle. 

' ' In exposing the mistakes of his predecessors, Mr Bancroft combines im- 
partiality of spii'it and soundness of judgment with thoroughness of research, 
so that his opinions, generally, will iDrobably be accepted by scholars as 
final."— 5'. F. Aha 

" The conscientious and intelligent care in the treatment of his subject 
gives the best of auguries for the value of the work. The conspicuous ab- 
sence of hero-worship, in the treatment of his cliaracters, is another peculiarity 
of the work. Mr Bancroft's style is marked by a charming grace and 
rhythm. It not infrequently presents long sustained examples of sentential 
structure, modeled and polished by the severest rules of the schools, and it 
sometimes pours itself along with a natural force and ruggedness, now and 
then rising to the height of grandeur. But its generic quality is formed in a 
straightforward directness which seems to ignore art, but which is, in reality, 
the equivalent of the best art in speech." — Kanscis City Journal. 

"The volumes thus far issued commend themselves to the historical student 
and the literary critic for their deep research, their conscientious and pains- 
taking handling of details, and for their grace of style." — Los ^^mjeles Daily 
Times. 

" This is a most stupendous undertaking: but Mr Bancroft seems to be 
adequately equipped for it, as well in the material he has brought together as 
in the intelligence, industry, and enthusiasm with which he prosecutes his 
work. " — Washington Evening Star. 

"His style is always clear and concise, often graphic and picturesque, with- 
out attempting sensational effects. His power of analysing events, as well as 
characters, cannot be denied ; and his ability of constructing a consecutive 
narrative out of a chaos of incoherent material, betrays unusual literary skill. " 
— New York Times. 

' ' The work has no parallel in literature. " — Henry Wai'd Beecher, 



ONE OF THE LATEST NOTICES RECEIVED. 

liOndon Morning Post. 

"The national distinctiveness of American character appears, perhaps, no- 
where so clearly as in the style of American writers. In this country the style 
of a writer is individual, in America it is national. To take, for example, the 
case of English historians, there is not a single common feature in the style of 
such men as Mr Lecky, Mr Froude, or Mr Freeman. So much cannot be said 
— to take the case of three American historians whose works are more or less 
familiar to English readers — of the styles of Mr Bancroft, ]\Ir Motley, or Mr 
D'Orsey Gardiner. Though differing in some respects in modes of thought 
and expression, there is a common feature of resemblance in the writings of 
all three. When one takes up the book of an English author and criticises its 
style, he never thinks of saying '* this is quite an English style. " He says, 
"This is A^ery like Mr Lecky, or Mr Froude, or Macaulay," as the case may 
be. But almost the first idea that strikes one in turning over the pages of an 
American book is "how thoroughly American is the style." And what is the 
distinguishing feature of American style ? The distinguishing feature of 
American style, like the distinguishing feature of Amei"ican character, gen- 
erally is "go." One is carried along from the very first page by an impetu- 
osity which is at once charming and irresistible. The interest is immediately 
awakened, the attention promptly fixed. There is something in the dash and 
flow of the style which in itself attracts and excites. We can perhaps give no 
better illustration of wliat we mean than by quoting the opening passages of 
Mr Bancroft's History of the Pacific States of North America. 

* * * * * * * 

"The freshness and vigor here displayed last to the end of the volume. 
But if we were to single out the individual characteristic which pre-eminently 
distinguishes Mr Bancroft's writings, we should fix on the wonderful care of 
which all his works bear suc^ unmistakable signs. The present volume- is a 
marvel of industry and hard work. The materials collected, the authorities 
consulted, the skill with which all have been collated and arranged, and the 
attractiveness of style in which the whole has been presented to the public, 
merit the highest i;)raise. Mr Bancroft commences his History of the Pacific 
States, which may be described as a continuation of his Native Paces of the 
Pacific States, with a brilliant sketch of Spain and European civilization in the 
beginning of the sixteenth century, and he then dashes into the subject proper 
of his book. In the Native Paces of the Pacific States, Mr Bancroft, as the 
title of the work suggests, dealt with the aboriginal inhabitants of the country. 
In the work now before us he treats of the European discoverers and settlers, 
and continues the history of the aboriginal inhabitants in a more advanced 
stage of social and political evolution. The narrative abounds in incidents of 
exciting interest and facts of great importance, social, historical, and political, 
rendering this latest literary achievment of Mr Bancroft a work attractive 
alike to the general reader, the historian, the statesman, and the sociologist. 
Of Mr Bancroft's Native Paces, men of prominence like Mr Herbert Spencer 
and Mr Lecky wrote in the most eulogistic terms, and no juster criticism can 
be pronounced on the distinguished American historian's recent production 
than to say that it is in every respect worthy of its predecessor iu the in- 
structive and important series of contributions to American history on which 
our author 1.3 engaged. " 



"Not only unequalled, but unapproached. A literary enterprise more deserving of a generoua 

sympathy and sujoport has never been undertaken on this side of the 

Atlantic." — [Noeth American Keview,] 



THE WORKS OF HUBERT HOWE BANCROFT. 



In 39 Volumes, Octavo, with Maps and Illustrations. 



Vols. I-V— THE NATIVE KACES OP THE PACIFIC STATES. 
Vols. VI- VIII.— HISTOKY OF CENTKAL AMEKICA. 
Vols. IX-XIV.— HISTORY OF MEXICO. 
, Vols. XV-XVI.— HISTOKT OF THE NOKTH MEXICAN STATES. 

Vol. XVII.— HISTOKT OP NEW MEXICO AND ARIZONA. 
Vols. XVIII-XXIV.— HISTOKT OF CALIFORNIA. 
Vol. XXV.— HISTORY OP NEVADA. 
Vol. XXVI.— HISTORY OP UTAH. 

Vols. XXVII-XXVIII.— HISTORY OF THE NORTH-WEST COAST. 
Vols. XXIX-XXX.— HISTORY OF OREGON. 

Vol. XXXI.— HISTORY OP WASHINGTON, IDAHO, AND MONTANA. 
Vol. XXXII.— HISTORY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA. 
Vol. XXXIII.— HISTORY OF ALASKA. 
Vol. XXXIV.— CALIFORNIA PASTORAL. 
Vol. XSXV.— CALIFORNIA INTER POCULA. 
Vols. XXXVI-XXXVII.— POPULAR TRIBUNALS. 
Vol. XXXVIII.— ESSAYS AND MISCELLANY. 
Vol. XXXIX.— LITERARY INDUSTRIES. 

The Histoky of the Pacific States is thecentral figure of this literary 
undertaking, the Native Races being preliminary, and the works following 
the History supplementary thereto. The territory covered is the western half 
of North America, from Jt'anamd. to Alaska, including all of Central America 
and Mexico, and is eq[uivalent in area to one-twelfth of the earth's surface. 



CONDITIONS. — The volumes will be well printed, on good paper, and 
neatly and substantially bound ; they will be uniform in style, and will average 
over 700 pages each. Three or four new volumes per annum will appear until 
the entire series is completed. Subscribers will not be obliged to take the 
work unless it corresponds with the description in every particular. 

Per Volume. 
Bound in Extra English Cloth, neat and attractive style, - $ 4 50 
Bound in Fine Leather, Library Style, - - - 5 50 

Bound in Half Calf, Half Riissia, or Half Morocco, - - 8 00 

Bound in Russia Leather or Tree Calf, - - - 10 00 

A. L. BANCROFT & CO., Publishers, 

SAN FRANCISCO, CAL. 



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